#i just had the opportunity to present this to tumblr audience

[liu4ka]

so i rewatched disney atlantis. try to guess which characters are my favorite, yeah it's very difficult, i know

here we are, bunch of redraws of timeless classic. you can't say it's not them

i ship them and shipname is "drill and blast" by the way.

[violetasteracademic]

I know this has been said a million times in a million ways, but I humbly request an audience to September Virgo out for a hot minute and share my dissertation on why the "Three Brothers and Three Sisters is *lazy writing*" take is by far the WORST.

If you found me through my Lucien Vanserra's Hero's Journey breakdown (I'll link that at the end) then you already know I am an absolute nerd about book structure. I do not beef with the other ships and genuinely love and am interested in every character in these shipwars. But I get a little hot when I see this take!

The reason being is that 3 and 3 is not "lazy writing." Lazy writing is:

⚫ Conveniently de-escalating all current stakes and conflicts established in the service of a romantic pairing.

⚫ Poorly pacing a book because now we have to explain why a character was thinking about offering another character 1 ticket to ride his face, but now he quickly wants someone else instead that many people offline don't even know about. Structure wise- (we are talking three act structure here, again I have broken that down in the link I'll post below) this means that by the end of Act One, the act in which the lead of our story has been presented with all of the information and their story has been laid out, they are now crossing into Act Two with clarity and set up, (side note-the first act is typically resolved within the first 20% of the book (or less!) we must resolve an existing romance with one character that has not even gotten its opportunity to be told in depth (i.e. Feyre and Tamlin). And reasonably introduce a new romance. As well as the introduction of new plotlines to accommodate the new romance. It's just... it's a plot and pacing nightmare. I'm getting the sweats even thinking about it.

⚫ Ignoring years worth of details and foreshadowing in an act of fan service because the fandom decided they don't like your character, even if you, as the author, very much do.

⚫ Introducing a brand new plot in the middle of a smorgasbord of unresolved plotlines so a newly introduced side character who has already had a complete arc in service of another main character can now become the next main character, leapfrogging over the remaining main characters who have been around since book one with active storylines in development.

Three and three is not "lazy writing." Three is simply a motif. A motif is an artistic/literary device. Three sisters. Three brothers. Three mountains. Three stars on the night court insignia, ect.

Writing is: Structure. Line level prose. Obstacles. Stakes. Character arcs.

I will absolutely allow the criticism that it is cheesy or corny. That is an opinion, and you are totally allowed to have it. We can respectfully disagree on that and it's no skin off my back.

However, Elriel (as well as Vassien) have the elements that *good* writing is comprised of. Characters with steadily increasing arcs. Obstacles at every turn. Incredibly high stakes. And in my opinion (though of course everyone is allowed their own opinion on this!) some downright BREATHTAKING one liners and line level prose in their interactions from ACOMAF all the way to the bonus chapter.

Please, I beg of you, understand that just because you do not like something does not make it lazy or poorly executed. Art is subjective, and when we use our taste to make objective assertions about things we don't prefer, art suffers.

For more on book structure and the possibilities of Lucien and Vassa's absolutely beautiful potential, hop on over here:

Thank you for your time 😂

[sebastianravkin]

Another Book Recommendation for 2024

Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

Seems obvious and possibly pointless for the Tumblr audience, but hear me out.

CONTENT WARNING: mention of dark moments in LGBTQ+ history.  If you would like to avoid, skip Point #1.

The below notes reflect a discussion concerning the book Good Omens I had with a group of my undergraduate interns over a couple of lunches last semester.  Given that they all loved the show, I had assumed they had all read the book.  Not all of them had, and for those that did, their knowledge of when the book was originally published and an understanding of its historical context was surprisingly limited.  I thought that others may be interested in these points, and so am sharing them here.  

1) *SKIP TO AVOID CONTENT WARNING* To understand the impact of Good Omens when it was published in 1990 on the LGBTQIA+ community, it helps to understand the cultural environment at the time of its publishing, at least in the United States. 

The book came out towards the end of the height of the AIDS epidemic (1981 - early 90s).  I can not stress enough how terrifying this was for the LGBTQIA+ community to live through.  People were afraid - of dying, of watching loved ones die, of being separated from their loved ones as they died, of being ostracized, of being denied medical help, of being attacked and beaten.  While there was a short fluorescence of nominal acceptance of the LGBTQIA+ community during the 1970s, the societal response to the AIDS epidemic was a huge step backwards.  People became cruel(er), whether out of fear or ignorance or opportunity.

Good Omens came quietly onto the scene during this time, providing an alternate universe in which a gay-presenting angel (and his gender-fluid demon friend) could live in a world without the AIDS crisis.  At the same time, this angel did live in fear of his world literally ending, and really would like to have just gotten back to his comfy chair and his Regency silver snuffboxes.  Escapism reading at its best, really.

In addition, the book was published in 1990, so before many of the cultural moments that helped lead to social change but are now taken for granted.  Such as . . . .

-Freddie Mercury died of AIDS in November 1991 (which, by the way, means there was a very short window of time where people were reading Good Omens while he was still alive).

-Sir Elton John came out in 1992

-“Don’t ask, don’t tell” became official policy of the U.S. Military in 1993 (finally repealed in 2011)

-the establishment of LGBTQIA+ centers on college campuses surged in the mid-1990s

-Ellen came out on her show in 1997

-Will and Grace first aired in 1998

-Matthew Shepard was murdered in 1998 (the Federal Hate Crimes Prevention Act bearing his name was not passed until 2007). 

2) The book is queer coded for 1990.  As queer coded as the show is for current times. 

I have heard multiple comments from GenZ students along the lines of ‘there is nothing queer about the book’, and I have read commentary that Neil Gaiman caved to fan pressure in modernizing the script for the show. But I have also heard comments from GenX peers, including one of whom said “it was the gayest book I read in the 90s”. I have highlighted 15 passages in my teaching copy of the book that would have been queer-coded in 1990, 12 of which would go unnoticed today as far as I can tell based on discussions with many of my Millennial and GenZ students. 

It is important to keep in mind that the vocabulary of the 1980s and 90s relating to the LGBTQIA+ community was exceedingly limited; Mr. Gaiman and Sir Pratchett worked within this limited vocabulary, and were working within the stereotypes of the times, to portray Crowley and Aziraphale. And readers are meant to love them. Possibly more importantly, the derogatory comments concerning Aziraphale come from unlikable characters, and so the reader not only ends up feeling defensive of the angel but also does not want to be associated with those who hold negative opinions of him. I can think of few better ways to create social change. 

In terms of the show adaptation, whenever I watch a movie or show based on a book, my first concern is whether or not the adaptation makes me feel the way the book did. I am not an artist, so I do not know how one translates the written to the visual and I do not envy those attempting to do so.  But I do know that successful adaptations are almost never a one-to-one translation. What I can say in this context is that, to me, the show does feel like the book in terms of its themes, its humor, its timely social commentary. So whyever and however Mr. Gaiman updated it, I would argue it was successful. 

3) It is my understanding that Good Omens is the first book written by cisgendered heterosexual males for a general audience that portrays a gay-presenting character and a gender-fluid character as main characters in a positive light that does not end in a tragic way.  This is huge.  This is Captain Kirk and Uhuru’s kiss huge. 

Historically, LGBTQIA+ people rarely get positive representation in mainstream media. Rather, LGBTQIA+ characters in literature were often portrayed as villains in early writing, and are often used as comedic relief in more recent work. When there is a sympathetic main character, their story usually ends in tragedy. While tragic stories are very much a reality for many LGBTQIA+ people, it is incredibly important to also have stories that do not end in heartbreak or death.  And it is also incredibly important for LGBTQIA+ characters to be part of the norm in main stream story telling as this leads to broader social acceptance. Good Omens provided LGBTQIA+ readers with a sense of belonging in the greater world, while ‘normalizing’ the happy existence of LGBTQIA+ people to a broader readership.  This type of representation, presented by heterosexual white cisgendered male authors (at the top of the power structure in 1990) is a key moment in the slow but steady grind leading to social change.

In summary, read the book. Whether you are a fan of the show or not, and regardless of your generation, this book has a lot going for it. Above and beyond its importance to the LGBTQIA+ community, the book includes broader commentary on religion, good vs. evil, right vs. wrong, and identity in general. The menacing humor of Gaiman and the loving satire of Pratchett is a combination that is unequaled. The book is funny, thought-provoking, well-written, and has a lot of great characters above and beyond a particular angel and demon (who are only in about 1/3 of the book).  And as you read it, understand its historical context, and love it for the role it played in getting us to this cultural point in time.

[gingerylangylang1979]

When a man knows, he knows

Disclaimer: I’m making this analysis solely based on my memories of Season 2 and all the Tumblr meta. I just don’t have the stomach to go back and rewatch quite yet because I do need to rewatch the Carmy and Claire scenes for more clarity. I’m still in recovery. 

So I keep trying to figure out the Carmy and Claire thing. There are so many angles and it’s a bit confusing. I get him trying to capitalize on the opportunity to explore the childhood crush and his youth, I get her ties to the Berzattos, I get that she was an escape and provided comfort and reassurance, I get that he couldn’t balance opening The Bear and starting a new relationship in the honeymoon phase, I get that he never showed his real self to her and she coddled him. 

My question, and I’m almost afraid to ask, but it must be done, is do they stand any kind of a chance if he did find balance, healed a bit, and felt worthy of love. Why am I asking this? Because I’m trying to imagine a scenario where he is doing better and what would make him try again with her. 

Maybe I have my Carmy and Sydney shipper goggles on but I keep coming back to choice. When a man knows, he knows. Of all the men in my life who were serious about me, they just knew. That doesn’t mean they weren’t nervous at times or may have asked those close to them for advice. But they just knew they were all in. And they were all in because of me, not to escape something else. A partner can be a solace in the storm, true. But there is a difference between recharging in the warmth and care of a partner after facing a battle. But that isn’t what Carmy did. He literally was running from obligations and using his very much undefined relationship as a hideout. 

So I never felt like he chose Claire. He had to be told to label it, he said he loved her a lot, and on some level perhaps he did/does (which later he switches back to like?), but it’s not the kind of in love that means a choice was made. And for as bad as it got in the finale, I’m not sure a new relationship is worth trying to rekindle when all of that hurt happened between two people and one is head over heels and the other one is having a panic attack at the thought of it. 

I mean what would be a proper next step? If they continue this into next season, my goodness. How would Claire have any dignity and what would be Carmy’s motivation? The only way I could see it is if because of him not being present for opening he slacks off with her again because he feels useless. But I don’t know if I see that, it would be a repeat of him using her as a distraction and would be boring for the audience. 

He’s also becoming aware of his feelings for Sydney and I think that will show more next season while they also have conflict about his commitment. Do we need Claire in the middle of that? The only way I would be okay with that is if the tables turn and Carmy goes hard for The Bear and Claire is the one asking for more while he is committed to Sydney (the storyline I wanted for this season). 

Anyways, rambles, rambles. 

[ferociouslycreativemystery]

I just finished the Button House Archives and it's SPECTACULAR. Here are some personal highlights:

I love Alison's additions and comments in lots of places. She is fighting tooth and nail to stay on those hinges, and we love to see a character with spunk!

Mick's facial reconstruction could be the most horrifying thing I have *ever* seen

Mary's bits are some of my absolute favourites. Her speaking/writing voice is just delicious

Pat was just a terrible group leader wasn't he XD the arrow was really just a matter of time. He should have gone orienteering with them first, then he might have lost the kids before they could kill him

HAH I unwittingly picked Kitty's "character quote" to use in my video edit :P I feel validated

Thomas with his painfully literal complaints about other people's poems OMG rip bestie you would have loved tumblr (I haven't listened to the audiobook yet but I swear I can hear his "counted them, did you?" through the page)

I really like the way you can glimpse parts of later documents around the edges of earlier ones (like with Pat's folder, where the layers are removed one at a time, p. 22-23, 40-41, etc)

Hang on, just gotta go put on One Night in Bangkok for Robin (wait, now I need to hear him say that out loud)

Cap's munitions requests and personally penned operations with their TERRIBLE hand drawn maps that he keeps sending to actual Southern Command; I am fascinated by your mind sir. I believe he suffers from the same affliction I had in school where a combination of the dunning-cruger effect regarding general knowledge and teachers not talking to you in person about what you write in hand-ins causes you to just sort of assume everything you do is brilliant and that then it simply disappears into an unknowable void, and therefore you feel basically free to confess to murder in writing without ever thinking of the consequences. Embarrassment and second thoughts are very much face-to-face kinds of emotions (as he. ahem. would come to find out). Like, is written communication even real? Did it ever really leave your head?

Also: his war diaries were published? 1) who chose to publish them and 2) did Havers ever come across them by any chance? (plus: love to see a fellow tiny handwriting person. Cheers!)

The hand lettering on everything is so well made!!! I know a little (heavy emphasis on 'little') about palaeography, and the writing styles are recognisably of their eras, if many of the letter forms have indeed been updated to be readable for modern audiences. Compare for example Arthur Pinhoe's writing from 1575 (p. 8-11) with this actual letter from 1547. Also this actual 1700s writing to Kitty's diary entries from 1779 (p. 70-71 etc). (These samples are in Swedish but minus åäö they're all the same letters.) The writing also follows the pattern of older script being generally more rigid and standardised, while the closer to present day we get the more individual the handwriting becomes, which is a great opportunity for additional characterisation—which has also been very well implemented I think. I'm devouring every page of this, line by line!

REST IN BRIEFS (also the sly tail of the 'y' from the Daily Mail title just visible above the only compassionate headline lmao)

The reason I cannot talk to people is that Fanny's etiquette rules on conversing take over my entire mind from the moment I see another person.

Oh Kitty, I am coming to pick you up—you can be my sister instead of Eleanor's. It was nice to read her final entry though; finally the trick backfired and she got something good out of it while Eleanor suffered. Bieetch.

FANNY. SINCERELY. YOU ARE INSANE. I already knew about the letter where she demands reimbursement for the unsunk 7/8 of the Titanic's journey that she was cheated out of, but to SIGN IT OFF WITH "Would be survisor/victim of the RMS Titanic". Unbelievable.

Pat write a legible word challenge

I have a slight suspicion Julian might have had something to do with the designs for the Boys Adventure Club badges...

The "pictures of the ghosts" will make excellent reference photos for the various rooms, I appreciate them very much (should we make a game out of copying them and filling in the ghosts? There is a lot of potential there)

Humphrey, my guy... do you need a hug? (Sorry.)

FLOOR PLANS FLOOR PLANS FLOOR PLANS THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH I WILL TREASURE THESE WITH MY LIFE

Robin's constellations are impeccable I say we officially replace the zodiac with these no more superstition only bum

Julian's final email was really well written; a single page yet it's oozing with character and story

The behind the scenes pictures at the end are heartwarming. I am slightly alarmed at my ability to pinpoint the precise scene in the specific episode many of them are from though... is it maybe time for a break?

No. Never!

[oleandertrees]

overactive spectatorship in the yj fandom

thank you to everyone who has filled out the google form so far!

i'm mostly a twitter user so tumblr is very much a foreign thing to me (i didn't even know how to properly put a link on here..Thank you to my friend mekenzie who pointed it out to me and then told me how to link it) but i appreciate very much all of you non-twitter users who filled it out. tumblr and twitter are the social media platforms i'm most interested in looking into because it gives the greatest opportunity for analysis and such!

i've only shared very briefly the idea behind this project on twitter so i thought i would explain a little bit about it here since i have more space LOL

i'm a third-year film student with a concentration in screenwriting, and i'm currently taking a critical studies class where we study a variety of different film theories. this (you guessed it!) includes spectatorship theory. to put it very briefly, there are two major types of spectatorship theory: passive and active.

passive spectatorship is, in essence, the belief that the audience doesn't have much say in what happens to them when they watch a movie. the film is merely something that happens To Them against their will. this can be very closely associated with the ideas of sergei eisenstein, who believed that audience reactions could be carefully engineered and predicted by using certain filmmaking techniques. passive spectatorship is also often tied to psychoanalysis, so it's very much involved with the freudian ideas of the subconscious. i personally was taught it under the lens of psychoanalysis and feminist film theory, so we also talked a lot about the voyeurism of the male audience member, the passivity of the female both on the screen and in the audience, and the oppositional gaze of the non-white female audience who takes a deeper look into what they're actually consuming.

which then brings us into active spectatorship. this is the idea that, no matter what, the audience is an active participator in what they're watching, even if they may not actually be aware of just how active the process of spectatorship is. for example, there are physiological processes going on in your brain that make it so you can actually perceive a film as a film, rather than just as a series of still images being projected in rapid succession. we cannot physically make ourselves see the film as images without slowing it down, because our brain is actively working to prevent the illusion from being broken. while this may be an unconscious process (rather than a subconscious process, like in passive spectatorship), it is still active. or, (and i think this one is really neat), to give another example, if you watch a film that is presented in a non-linear fashion (take oppenheimer, for ex.), and someone then asks you to recall the story of the film, you'll tell the story linearly even though the information wasn't presented to you as such. your brain is automatically and actively working to reconstruct the events as you consume them.

furthermore, your brain also builds up a library of references over time from all of the many films, television series, books, etc. you've consumed that enable you to better understand each and every thing that you watch. MEDIA LITERACY FTW! so, to give an ex. here, imagine taking someone who had never seen a slasher before, sitting them down, and making them watch a slasher. they're not going to have any baseline knowledge of what they're watching, so they won't be aware of tropes, references, etc. that are included in the film. there likely wouldn't be a high level of predictability for them, b/c they don't have anything to base their hypotheses on (and the formation of hypotheses are a big part of active spectatorship). contrast this with someone like myself (who loves slashers, watches a lot of them, and loves reading horror & slasher film theory) watching a slasher, who is (whether i want to or not) going to be picking apart every part of the slasher because i have this library of references up in my noggin that i'm pulling from.

sorry for that very longwinded explanation before actually getting into what i personally am doing, but i feel like it is important to know and (i think) it's pretty interesting so hopefully you got something out of it anyhow.. SO! the morning i was doing my readings on active spectatorship for class, it just so happened to be the day after the timeline from the yellowjackets scripts were released, and there was a great deal of conversation about this timeline and particularly about jackie's birthday. this all seemed to me to be a confirmation that spectatorship, indeed, was very active. but the more i thought about it, the more it seemed to go beyond just active spectatorship and into a sort of "overactive" spectatorship.

this is something that i find to be most prevalent (at least from my own fandom experiences over the last ~9 years of being in online fandom spaces) in the yellowjackets fandom. never have i been in a fandom where people spend as much time picking apart every little detail and going to such great lengths to analyze each and every thing that is shown (or not shown!) on the screen. hence why i included questions on the form specifically about analysis and headcanons (i think fanfiction would be another interesting thing to look at, but i think inherently headcanons fit much more along the lines of analysis than a lot of fanfiction does! coming from a fanfic writer..Please don't take that the wrong way...i am a fanfiction lover).

so, to make a long story short, i want to look at (and write about) the ways in which the yellowjackets fandom takes active spectatorship to the extreme and turns it into overactive spectatorship through the analyses and deep conversations that are had about this series on social media spaces. it may not always seem like it, but fandom can be a legitimately important thing, especially within the spheres of theory that i'm talking about here. it can be incredibly illuminating in understanding the ways in which people interact with the media that they consume! and i think that the yellowjackets fandom is an immensely fascinating little slice of all of this, and (hopefully) this project can be something that people can get something out of and learn from.

i'm stupidly busy as the semester is starting to near its close, so this is just the beginning of a very long process, but i once again want to thank everyone who has already filled it out (and especially to those who have provided links for me to their analysis and headcanon posts!). and, if you haven't filled it out already and would like to, i'll link it again here. :)

[captainhunnicutt]

What is your favorite BJ episode? And if it's different, what is BJ's best episode he's in?

Hello my sweet Bard. Thank you for the ask and giving me a reason to ramble about one of my favorite topics. BJ Hunnicutt.

My favorite BJ episode is hands down "BJ Papa San." I am continuously baffled how this isn't a general fan favorite - and I don't even mean in this microcosm of fandom on Tumblr. I mean Mash fans at large. The episode never makes any "Top _____" lists. It's never an episode that people seem to really discuss or want to sink their teeth in to, unless you're already a fully fledged Beejgirl. I guess it makes sense when I force myself to take my Beej colored glasses off, and try to look at all of the episodes as a normal human who hasn't had a brain rot for so long that it's become a major part of their identity.

BJ is immediately presented to the audience in a very structured and controlled way. The calm persona is laid out and we all eat it up without hesitation. The characterization slots in nicely with the opposite ones surrounding him, and a level head is needed to balance things out within the entire camp - and his wackiness in turn balances himself out. It's just a nice fit. But we all become too comfortable with BJ always being calm, and seeing him have his shit together. There are hints dropped along the way that he is slowly coming apart at the seams, and in fairness, they seem to go ignored. He tells us in "Our Finest Hour," how angry he is - but he says it in that soothing and calm voice that it truly doesn't feel like it registers just how angry he actually is... and then "BJ Papa San" happens.

We see him break down and grant himself permission to express his anger, or maybe he's so angry that the man behind the curtain just shows himself without a second thought. And to have him get angry over another family being ripped away from him - makes it even more upsetting. I've always read BJ as someone who's self-worth is wrapped up in the idea of always having to be more than enough. Exceeds expectations. Is needed. Is wanted. That all of these things mixed together makes a man worthy of everything he has worked for. And to be first ripped from it himself and then to have a parallel version rip itself away from him - it only makes sense that he would lose his cool. It allows the viewers a glimpse into the idea that war can and will bring out the worst in people, and that idea of "worst," isn't always demonstrated in violence or brutality. It can be showcased in losing control of carefully crafted images to become the exact opposite of what you want everyone to think you are. No one is safe from a war. Not physically. Not mentally. Not emotionally - and BJ is such a beautiful character to demonstrate that notion.

I'm not entirely sure how to answer the best episode that BJ is in, because I think a lot of the episodes that he's in and has a serious plot point to take part in - are insanely important to his character. Even the ones where he's helping deliver a cow, or dressed up as a clown with water bottles on his feet - like, they all shed light on what makes this man him.

I'm going to take this opportunity to just say, I know BJ gets a bad wrap. I understand (on a very basic level), that he is not really a "fan favorite," and that's fine. He doesn't have to be, and I don't feel an obligation to defend him. BJ Hunnicutt is not real - but he means something to me. I see a lot of myself in him and the way he rationalizes (or doesn't), and the absurdity of zeroing in on things that someone else may not understand as being important or upsetting. I relate to his propensity to keep everything bottled up until it comes out in the most unhealthiest of ways, and I have for years upon years. We are (were in his case) works in progress.

So yeah, he can be a little shit and I get why people may not like him, but to me he is one of the most complicated and well developed characters of all time.

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

[trlvsn]

zero escape preach sparked by the other ask and me wanting to interact with one of my favorite aa ranters/artists out there. what a perfect opportunity. anyways most fans would agree the writing gets weaker with each entry (some people think it peaked at the second game but imo the first is the strongest as a whole) but it is INSANE. it will mess with your head with all the bullshit it throws at you. the characters infodump entire wikipedia pages to each other. sudoku has never been more emotional. there is a Weird Girl that Does Things. the music is incredible. i doubt the characters were intended to be super deep but there was so much room for me to overthink some of them and rotate them in my mind for days. oh yeah you can rotate items in your inventory post-ds-release-aa-style it's very fun. the puzzles are as well although they get increasingly more infuriating. funyarinpa. uhh some fictional religion mixed in that you might have fun comparing to irl?? i don't know enough about any to make a valid statement on that tbh. did i mention the weird girl

all in all i think zero escape would be a 50/50 for you and you might like it more for the subtext than what the story presents itself as. except when the mindfucks happen maybe.

on that note i'd love to pitch in uchikoshi's other franchise, ai: the somnium files. but that's for another day

also i think you would really like bsd

i adore your posts omg...... i already said you're one of my favorite creators but i can't stress that fact enough...... from opening my mind to thoughts i'd never have to fueling my kristoph and dahlia obsession..... your thoughts are so worth dissecting and putting them out there. i am shit at compliments. tell me where i can find umineko.

god. i do love sudoku a lot....anon, this is pretty good advertising, noted!!! maybe i will play it someday and judge the hell out of it, but also probably enjoy some parts. who knows, maybe my pretentious ass will even like it.

and hey! i actually had a huge bsd phase at ages 14-16! i don't particular enjoy it now, though, i guess it feels unnecessary to me now. i am growing a little tired of the standard portrayals of abuse cycles and finding yourself. fiction needs to get a little more extraordinary for me at this point, or a bit more high-brow, i guess.

and thank you so much??? for the compliments??? it's insane to me how i can be one of someone's favorites here. not in a self-hating way, tumblr has actually made me think of myself as the coolest guy alive, it's just very unexpected every time.

i played umineko using a torrent file my friend sent me, so i could email you that if you come out of the shadows and turn out to be over or exactly my age, as i am uncomfortable recommending it to a younger audience due to the everything in it. i guess it's on steam as well, but the sprites there suck so bad and i don't recommend it at all.

[darkkitty1208]

Congratulate hon!!!

Woooo you open the box again, I’m soooooo excited🥹 Finally I got chance👀 Let me send a prompt^^:

This will be their first Christmas together, but Stephen got hit with an age regression spell, 38 years old man was turned into a quiet five-year-old boy during his last mission.

It’s not a big deal, he just needs only one week to get back to normal. The only problem is that Christmas is in this week and they planned to celebrate together.

Tony was determined to give Stephen the best Christmas ever, because he remembered that Stephen had said that his family wasn’t rich when he was a kid and after his sister’s death, he had never celebrated Christmas again. And he stayed at the hospital for the Christmas when he was a doctor, since he had no family and few friends, no need for a holiday.

So to him, this spell will be the best chance to give kid Stephen a Christmas he deserves.

☺️Thanks sweetie, hope you’ll like it! Oh and if you take it plz plz, include Avengers Family, and maybe h/c! I really love your Hurt/Comfort works😭

Ahhhh!! I love your excitement so much <33 Thank you so much for the prompt, lovely!

For those curious, I'm opening my ask box on tumblr in celebration of Christmas and a 400 followers special. Feel free to drop by there!

Tony stared at where a short figure jumped up and down in oversized robes that dangled over his shoulders and draped down the floor, a mop of raven black hair popping on the top.

A kid.

There was a kid trying to jump up the bookcase, his chubby hand gripping the air as he tried desperately to grab a book from high up a shelf.

The kid turned around upon his presence, and Tony knew right then and there who he was the moment he looked into the boy's eyes.

It was Stephen's.

"...Stephen?" Tony asked, "Jesus Christ on a fucking unicycle."

OR

Stephen gets hit with an age regression spell a week before Christmas. Tony sees this as the perfect opportunity to throw him the best Christmas party. 

Words: 2235, Chapters: 1/?, Language: English

Series: Part 4 of Tumblr Requests

Fandoms: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Iron Man (Movies), Doctor Strange (Movies)

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: M/M

Characters: Tony Stark, Stephen Strange, Peter Parker, Natasha Romanov (Marvel), Clint Barton, Bruce Banner, Sam Wilson (Marvel), Wong (Marvel), Michelle Jones, Ned Leeds

Relationships: Tony Stark/Stephen Strange, Avengers Team & Stephen Strange, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers

Additional Tags: Mentioned Steve Rogers, Mentioned Bucky Barnes, Mentioned Thor (Marvel), Hurt/Comfort, Age Regression/De-Aging, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Party, Christmas Presents, Stephen Strange Needs a Hug, Tony Stark/Stephen Strange Parenting Peter Parker | Supremefamily | Strange Family, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Not Canon Compliant, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Not Canon Compliant with Movie: Avengers: Infinity War (2018), How Do I Tag, Mentioned James "Rhodey" Rhodes

(Uploaded in link form for... we'll, admittedly, my convenience. Formatting here gets a bit difficult)

PS, Apologies for the lame title, I couldn't think of anything else. Sing it in the tune of Jingle Bells, pretty please.

[south-park-meta]

tbh It made me realise the reason why I loved SP's take on depression was better, if u compare Stan with other characters whose purpose is being social commentary on depression and mental health (Effy Stonem from Skins and Hanah Baker from 13 RW).

Hannah Baker (13RW)

Her character frustates me because 13 RW had so much potential,the idea was creative,narrating how many stuff drove her to suicide: from bullying,h4rr4sment,SA'D r4pe, not only adressing depression but to adress those things as well.

I know the author's intention and Selena Gomez's idea were good and focus on mental health but the development was icky,some dialogues feel rushed to arrive to the tragedy, some traumatic events feel to gave shock value to the audience than genuiely comment on it, besides how the series remarks you that if the love interest would have confesed Hannah, It would have saved her.

Which is very hurtful for many reasons.

A partner can help u throught recovery and being moral support but they aren't ur therapist, adding the fact that selling the idea "if he would have confessed,he would have saved her" when confessing or just be with them doesn't automatically saved them??.

Very different with SP, like Wendy and Kyle genuinely wanted to help Stan, but their moral support isn't enough to get him out of depression and sometimes it can be tiring for others (Kyle)

However If we compare a character that is more similar w/ Stan.

• they are both main characters and the leader of their friendgroup.

• they are the younger sibling.

• they can be charismatic,smart, and independant from such young age

• they can be bit arrogant sometimes.

• both of them are done with everyone's bs.

• both of them distrustful of adults, and sometimes get embarrased at their parent's stupidity.

•struggles with relationship, fear of abandoment.

• heavy uses of alcohol plus depression.

However their character differs on how the writers made them, while Skins's purpose was to show life never ends how u want it to be, and endings could be most be sad or just neutral,healing. Showing adolescence,teens struggling with addictions,disfunctional families,etc.

Skins GLAMOURIZED her depression,unlike her brother's behaviour. He was villianized (bc he was an asshole,he deserved it but he matured),he got heavier consequences. unlike her, while her friends and her love interest were fed up,they forgave her too quickly. it also presents u the narrative "love interest saves depressed person" to a whole level, while she was ""recovering". Out of nowhere,her bf gets killed by her psychiatrist?? Out of shock value. Even when she gets a bit of consequences she managed to manipulate to save herself, even with that smirk of "I'm effy stonem I'm always get what I want".

Effy represents an unhealthy and glamourized ideas of depression that the show pushed on it's female fanbase. (as someone w/ depression, when I saw the show I questioned why my depression didn't make me mysterious and prettier or get a bf that saved me from it)

"Her depression it's destructing her but that makes her even prettier and mysterious, ppl want to be her or fuck her"

and it had such an impact that on tumblr when the show came out until this day, many ppl want to be as mentally ill as Effy or fuck her.

Stan's depression and his self destructive tendencies is never showed as something that makes him mysterious or quirky. Neither his philosophy and way of thinking. His conflicts don't feel like to be shock value.

Althought he didn't get therapy at all,it protrayed realistically how some ppl don't get opportunity to be treated, and how sometimes they just have to move forward, feeling like shit but then a neutral point u don't care about anything,neither happy or sad, and keep moving.

Plus his personality,his behaviour in certain situations makes him more relatable to me than any character.

Tegridy farms burning? It was smth u see was coming. Because his anger is explosive, he puts out with his father behaving like a child,drinking,sometimes belittle him, always fighting with this mom for dumb stuff. The farm was an idea clearly Shelly,Sharon and him disliked. And them fighting over the divorce bc Randy didn't want to share money w/ Sharon was his breaking point, the impulsiveness "oh fuck it farm goes boom bc he is an asshole" cost him sister's life in the bad ending.

They showed Wendy trying to be suppoetive but not as his therapist or "love interest saves depressed person". Neither make Kyle his therapist or sm.

And it sometimes surprised me how SP while is social commentary is also dark humor and parody treated depression withot demonizing Stan neither glamourizing his depression.

Honestly his character is so interesting i could analyze that bitch for hours.

Idk how to expressed it but ugh.

I haven't seen Skins so I don't have a point of reference for it lol. I'm gonna go on a bit of a tangent with this.

Depression in South Park and its fandom is a tricky thing because I think a lot of people don't have realistic, or sensitive, headcanons about depression. Which is probably obvious by my whiny posts lately lol.

But it's also something, both for South Park as a fandom and media at large that needs to be looked at pretty carefully. There's a lot of headcanons that if I'm being blunt I think are God awful and insensitive if people think about it critically at all. Which I do try to weigh with the source being South Park which can in itself be insensitive.

The thing that makes South Park as a source fairly unique is it represents a more stereotypically 'masculine' depression. Which isn't to say women can't or don't act that way. But the 'explosive' depression is something that is more typically present in men. And that isn't something that is often present in media as a whole; the typical depiction of depression is more by-the-book representative of young women. (Again not exclusively so. Some of Stan's more annoying/negative traits are things I've felt and worked to outgrow. Probably some I've failed at lol). It also feels very authentic, presumably because Stan is so much of Trey in ways that characters aren't typically so emotionally autobiographical and usually have multiple writers.

That leads to the crux of my waffling with a lot of handling of depression. It very often is based on female depression, and whether in media or fandom is often based on stereotypes of this, such as cutting etc. A lot of stereotype appears because the authors can't personally relate. But then again, quite often authors DO relate to this, and it occurs so often because the authors themselves are more typically women than men, in particular in fandom. But on the other OTHER hand, depression is often treated as childishly annoying and something to grow out of, and in mocking it it very often is done by exaggerating the female depression stereotype that everyone has in their heads. Even in South Park there's a mess of trying to write mental illness but not being able to relate personally, relating personally but not presenting in the same way as is typical the demographic represented and shown in South Park, and finding mental illness annoying and actively mocking it, usually in these underhanded kind of headcanons.

Anyway this is a mess lol I'm about to clock out for work but hopefully there's still something decent in what I said. Mental illness and its representation is so multifaceted! Maybe I'll talk more about it tomorrow when I'm off :) thanks for the ask!

ETA Now that I'm back home:

Overall what makes good representation is:

Knowing from personal experience

Being earnest

There are at times things you can extrapolate from your personal knowledge of being human and feeling emotions even if you don't know things personally. But it's going to always feel truer when it is truer even with the best of intentions.

Being earnest makes a huge difference, too, and is something I think people forget. Shows like South Park can be and often are insensitive, but the feelings behind them are also often authentic and earnest. Shows like Skins, often aren't earnest by design in that more dramatic/soap opera based shows are usually looking for more shock value than emotional authenticity (someone feel free to correct me if I've missed the mark on the genre though. This is just what I've vaguely picked up from Skins from seeing like 2 or 3 eps and knowing the general premise lol). I think it also speaks to my earlier points in that the VAST majority of the writing credits for this show are men and have no lived experience as being a depressed teen girl. No lived experience and a desire for emotional reaction over emotional connection is, to me, always going to lead to a less 'true' outcome. Even if the show has its own positive merits.

I actually DID read Thirteen Reasons Why (in high school) and watched uhhh about 15 minutes of the show, which I quit because it struck me as OTT in a way that I don't really like. I did like the book okay but also thought at the time 'this dude doesn't know what it's like to be a girl', which is the crux of a lot of problems. But I do think Jay Asher has his heart in the right place which covers up some of the problems. I've heard a little bit about the show that makes me inclined to agree it leans into shock value though.

Side note as a rec, everyone should watch Ordinary People. That movie's good as hell.

[therehavebeenstranger]

i know people on here who follow me aren't theater people necessarily but i am OBSESSED with this interview with Sarah Porkalob in Vulture about her role in the 1776 revival/the show in general.

Since I heard about the revival, I've been wary of it. I find, lately, that a lot of big revivals are doing these kind of under thought casting changes to try and "update" older musicals, often to the detriment to the complexity of, say, their gender politics (yeah, I'm talking about company. Putting A Woman There doesn't make more feminist. Girl Bobbi Company is less about gender than the original flavor, but I shan't go on about that here). Here, it seemed suspect--like, sure, while casting 1776 with non-white non-men could GESTURE at a reckoning w the white supremacy of the original text/the subjects thereof, to quote an entirely different musical, "it ain't necessarily so." asking a non-white actor to embody a slaver is not a de facto revolutionary statement (take, for example, hamilton's discomfort with thomas jefferson. casting a black man to play jefferson does not make "sally won't you be a lamb" a more comfortable line NOR does it, in itself, complicate that relationship. it just.... asks a black person to inscribe that on their body. not great bob!)

all of this just to say that porkalob is remarkably (and sometimes hilariously) frank about the failures of the production, both in terms of process and the resultant product.

tumblr isn't letting me upload screenshots, so here's my fave quotes:

"What do you think is the effect of that casting? The casting is providing resources. The resources include a weekly salary, but also exposure for actors who traditionally would not be cast in this show. In terms of visibility, it is showing our audiences all of these faces that wouldn’t typically be seen. It’s also inviting our audiences to consider how our country was founded without the consideration of people like our cast in mind. Those are the three things I think it’s doing successfully. After that it gets a little complicated … a lot complicated, I should say.

What do you mean?1776 was written in the 1960s by two dudes. It won the Best Musical Tony over Hair. When it was written, during the Vietnam War, there was a generation of people who had bought into the American Dream, and part of the American dream was fighting for democracy. Then there was this generation after them that thought, Maybe we are sending our young men off to die for no reason. So it’s funny to look at 1776 and Hair as two very different musicals written at the same time, but in response to the same thing. 1776 has this desire to humanize the Founding Fathers and feels like a call back to nostalgic Americana. It’s like, Look at these good ole boys. They were just guys doing this stuff. To me, the play is a relic. It is a dusty, old thing."

"Then there is “The Egg,” which presents all these great moments of American history that happened after the events of the show by projecting scenes from them during the song. It did throw me off given that your production seems to be critiquing American exceptionalism. What do you think of that number? I think the directors missed a very obvious opportunity with that song to point back at American history in the way they said they wanted to. What we see in the projection is a collage of America’s history of protest, but do you know what it was sorely missing? The protests that were happening on Capitol Hill in January. Those people were literally chanting “1776.” It’s a choice. I would have been like, Let’s have this be a rock-out fucking song while we show those images of white supremacists charging Capitol Hill."

"Are you artistically fulfilled being in 1776? No, I’m not. The salary is good."

"How do you see queerness interacting with the show? I’ll be honest and say that our directors never thought about that. When we were all in the room together, there wasn’t any conversation about how we marry our queer identities with these characters, which is disappointing. It was clear that they were prioritizing the social identifier of race as a driving creative choice more than anything else. Gender identity, sexual identity — those we weren’t talking about.

Were you directed to play men? Yes, but in a very specific way. We were directed in the beginning of our Boston run to play at being men. It was in the posturing and the gestural work that we were doing in the choreography. According to our choreographer and directors, it had a masculine energy. I think honestly, in that Boston run, that approach did a huge disservice to us as actors. A lot of people were caught up in wondering, Am I a man? Am I myself? Who am I? I decided to pull back in, because I felt, I can’t act in ways that are exciting to me if I’m just playing at being a man. I had to change some things on my end to make it better for me."

it's a great interview and not a super long read. i really appreciate Porkalob's insights and admire her refusal to capitulate to the commercial theater machine. and i'm glad she got that salary :)

[tommytwostep2]

Tumblr 2- Ethos, pathos, logos

For this analysis I chose Inky Johnsons speech, “It’s Not Just About You,” a motivational speech which employs ethos, pathos, and logos throughout the message. This rhetorical artifact uses these elements to better convey his message and connect to the audience who potentially share similar situations. The rhetorical appeals in this message are productive and ethical. I will discuss the productiveness of this speech through the use of the context, and analyzing how ethos, pathos, and logos are employed while still being ethical. 

Inky Johnson establishes his ethos through his personal struggles he had to overcome in his childhood. He uses the struggles of growing up in a rough neighborhood in a two-bedroom house filled with fourteen people where he had to sleep on the floor with cockroaches and rats. The struggles that he faced as a child help establish the character of the speaker. These show he is credible as he has been in their shoes and had the same opportunity as the Tennessee players he is talking to and is knowable of the struggles they all faced in getting to the position they are in now.  The second way he is able to establish credibility is through his career ending injury assuming the audience has faced the struggles of an injury as well. The injury provides himself credibility for talking about the struggles he has been through. This shows the struggle and that he has seen the worst of it which, he will use to reinforce his idea of selflessness and “It’s Not Just About You.” Connections back to his childhood and his struggles provide true credibility and give the audience the ability to feel as if they can grow with the message, as he is preaching to them. 

Johnson uses the emotional appeal (pathos) strategically throughout the speech evoking a sense of selflessness and promotion of team ideals. He talks about how he grew up in a low-income area and the high school he went to had a higher dropout rate than its graduation rate. With 86% of Division one athlete coming from below the poverty line, he uses this to have an emotional appeal to his audience. (Fordham) By using these examples, the players on the team can relate to Johnson and his emotional language which captures the struggles of his childhood. Johnson then speaks on his career ending injury and how it had a large impact on his life. Again, this is something the audience can connect to as football is a contact sport where injuries happen. The injury suffered could have taken his life and the way he presents this story with emotional language appeals to the audience. It would have been easy for Inky after his injury to say, “why me” instead of “why not me” to appeal to selflessness and his bigger message of “It’s Not Just About You.” The emotional appeal is strong because the audience sees how it would be much easier to lull on the bad event that happened to Inky and take the mindset of “why me.” Using the severity of his stories and his emotional language Inky can appeal to the audience with pathos. 

Logos, the rational and logical arguments, is a rhetoric strategy used by Inky to better connect with the Tennessee team he is speaking to. He is able to use logos very efficiently because he is the firsthand source to the events he is talking about. Inky was able to make a logical argument to help reinforce his selflessness. With Inky talking about his own experiences, it makes him more trusted to the audience as he saw it and lived it. One instance of logos in this speech comes when he is talking about the opportunity he had to go to a private school and get a guaranteed scholarship. He refuted this idea by suggesting that he stay at the lowest performing public school. To the naked eye this might seem like an absurd decision and not backed with very much thought. He then goes on to explain the logic behind this was that he wanted to be with his family who was sleeping on the floor with him. He wanted to bring those family members who presumably did not have a bright future ahead of them, along with him in his journey to success.  He then said, “If every decision and choice you make is just about you, at a certain point you are going to hit something that is a lot tougher than you and it’s going to make you quit because you don’t have a driving force for why you do what you do.” Inky uses this story and connection to come full circle with his idea of “It’s Not Just About You” and his overlapping idea, selflessness. 

Inky Johnson’s powerful speech “It’s Not Just About You” effectively uses ethos to promote his credibility as a speaker and to connect with the audience, pathos to provoke emotion through his rigorous life journey, and logos to make logical arguments enforcing his central theme of selflessness. Throughout this rhetorically productive message, Inky was able to evoke emotion, inspire, and motivate the audience through his dialogue. Inky left the audience motivated and understanding of their why, how, and what in life. 

Citations

Fordham Research Commons. (n.d.-a). https://research.library.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1005&context=fulr-online-blog 

YouTube. (2016, September 30). Inky Johnson -- “it’s not just about you.” (motivational video). YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeWg73GzVbc 

[morticiafattymshasabeard]

No Fooling: Dark Force Fest Saturday, April 1st, 2023 Review

(Hi, few days later Morticia here! I'm transferring the original Blogger post to Tumblr, and am fleshing out more of the content with links and anything new I've learned in the days following the event.)

I know I have other posts I really should have written and posted long before this one, but it is what it is. I'm just a girl with a cellphone and a passion to talk about this festival Right NOW.

Why am I only writing about Saturday? Because it was the only day I could go.  I had an Amazing time and wouldn't trade a single second of it for anything.  

Dark Force Fest is a 3-Day Alternative Music and Lifestyle Festival in New Jersey. Formerly a convention known as "Dark Side of the Con", Dark Force Fest has an amazingly Passionate and Prolific Organizer, Jet, and is presented through his company, former Social Media site now Gothic Retail store, VampireFreaks. VampireFreaks is a topic for another post and maybe a full video deep dive.  There's so much to cover, there was so much to do! I chose to check out the Swap Meet, the Live Bat Exhibit, The Super Smash Bros Tournament (I lost), and the Goth Dad Q&A. While  I could have walked into any number of bands, I specifically saw Carnivore A.D.'s Tribute to Type O Negative. For all my fan-girling about Vision Video with my friends, I couldn't stay for their show.  A quick note: While there was the banner on the outside of the Sheraton, there wasn't anything telling you where registration was. The few people milling around outside were talking in groups that seemed to be attendees. There was one Security guard inside of the Main hotel entrance to tell us to "go out and around". Signs, Please! Let's start this wordy tour of DFF2023 with the first thing we encounter after registration: the Vendors. Gathering the creative, dark minded Artisans that build our community via Clothes, Jewelry, Housewares, Cosmetics, and Consumables, Dark Force Fest gives a physical location to many vendors that would otherwise not have as targeted an audience at their local Farmer's Markets on Sunday mornings. It also gives prospective buyers, and online followers, the opportunity to meet the artists, and make the decisions they need in order to ensure they make a great purchase they'll brag about for years to come. There is nothing more satisfying than saying "This was handmade by_____ !" and knowing you're helping directly keep our community thriving. In some cases, you're literally saving lives.  A few of the Artists that I interacted with mentioned how they traveled a few Hours to vend at the festival, but felt it was worth it to be more immersed in their culture. A few lucky vendors would share the concert rooms with the shows, getting themselves some pretty comfortable seats to a plethora of bands. One such vendor was the effervescent Shirley, The Tragic Doll. She creates deeply personal works of art about living with Scleroderma, an autoimmune disease that she describes as feeling trapped in her own skin. Incorporating Skeletal imagery and the color Red, representing Blood, to symbolize the effects of her condition, Shirley hand makes every piece of her Horror Art with passion, and anatomically correct hearts, because her motto is "Live My Heart Out".  Thanks to the map and a few kind Vendors, I was able to find the Swap Meet in the Skyland room. This was my first Swap Meet and I was surprised to find a few items in my size, or near enough I can modify them in future content. Everyone there was so helpful and wonderful, suggesting items they think would fit me or suit my style, and I'm so thrilled to say they were absolutely correct! (Thank you Rainbow Fairy; you took my hat in return for your snake skull dress.) The kindness and sense of community in that one room was so awesome, it really made me love being a part of this culture. Swap Meets are a great way to clear some unused clothes/boots/accessories from your closet and pick up something you might love forever. The Swap Meet at Dark Force Fest was Free with registration. While looking for the Batcave and taking some photos of the overall hallways, I passed Dusty Gannon of Vision Video without noticing. So, behold this glorious shot of Goth Dad being a Goth Rock Daddy.

The Star Wars cosplay group, the 501st stormtroopers, were raising money for charity.  There was an interesting skeletal capital(ism) M mouse sculpture by Jasin Cadic in the main lobby of the hotel. "The Batcave" was an ongoing  Live Bats Exhibit w/ Joseph D’Angeli (NJ Batman). Joseph D’Angeli’s “Bat-Cave” is the only facility specializing in bat conservation in the NY/NJ area. These cuties were pretty shy, but so was I.

 Feeling a little worn out, we wandered out to the food trucks and picked up poutine to snack on while determining if we had the energy for a band. I believe it was the hotel that provided extensive options for more food inside of the event, in front of the Main Ballroom. I'm really glad there was free Water stations and clean Restrooms tucked around the venue. There was a water station in the Batcave, and a private bathroom in the Gaming rooms that I knowingly used, there was most likely more. 

Deciding we needed to rest from the sensory overload, we found the Super Smash Bros Tournament, and we're incredibly thankful for this respite. There were a handful of other people so we all took turns warming up. As I had planned around seeing Carnivore A.D. and Goth Dad, I did leave immediately after I lost my bracket.

Carnivore A.D. is the closest to Type O Negative live as you can possibly get in 2023. No joke, they're Peter Steele's former Carnivore bandmates! I wanted to see this show because 1. I like TON. 2. My bestie loves TON and I miss her a lot. 3. They pair well with The 69 Eyes. I definitely fucked up by headbanging,  but it's irresistible! 

We had a little time left and found Goth Dad's Q&A still going back in the Skyland room. People had some great questions, and it was powerful to hear him speak on the horrors of active combat. Dusty Gannon, the internet's "Goth Dad", has made a huge impact on how Goths and Goth Culture is seen and accepted online through Tiktok and Instagram. The Goth Dad persona is a Gentle, Kind, and Accepting person that you want to have call you sport and pat you on the head. Embracing the gender breaking styles of Post Punk influences, Dusty creates intense and stunning eye makeup looks and can be caught performing in torn tights, skirts, Fishnets and Lace tops, alongside his bandmate, Emily, as Vision Video.

We had to leave to make a dinner reservation with some friends from the area. My paper wristband didn't hold up, it frayed from being too tight and handwashing, and popped right off in the car while on our way to dinner. I didn't want to push my luck trying to get in later with a broken band.

Needless to say, I'm super excited for the next Dark Force Fest, and will be doing a whole lot more planning and managing to get to enjoy even more of it to share with you all. 

Somethings I wish I had checked out (limiting to Saturday Only events: this list would get too long for the whole weekend):

-Custom fit Fangs -The Costume Contest hosted by Electronic Saviors: Industrial Music to Cure Cancer -Write a Song with Bella Morte -Nightmare Before Christmas Shadowcast -V is for Villains -Leathers - Vision Video  -Actors

Thanks for Reading all this!  Reach out to me on my socials: Linktree

Jet, if you read this, DM me on Instagram, please. I'd love to talk. 

[datonebird]

Finding a new career - Chapter 1

Wow I can't believe I made a new tumblr. Somewhere out there my old tumblr is still alive, and I am determined to find it.... Anyways! Welcome to my journey in changing my career. I wanted to make a video series with this, which I am still going to do, but for now I just want to put my thoughts down somewhere that I can access. I could have used my notes app on my laptop but I think, this makes me feel like I'm actually writing for an audience.

okay! enough rambling on, let's just get to it. I am on a journey to change and enter a new career. Long story short, I have been a business owner for the past 6 years and during those years I had some part time and full time jobs to help sustain myself as my business was in its growing stages. Eventually, I entered the business full time and after some extremely painful experiences, I decided for myself that this is not really what I want to do for the rest of my life. That decision was liberating. I still remember how confident I felt, and I really hade no doubts. Don't get me wrong, the thought of giving it all up was present all the time during my time owning the business, but it never felt this real. So I trusted myself and I said hey let's go with this feeling, there's obviously a reason why I feel this way. I've never felt so decisive in my life and honestly it was exciting! I was excited to enter a new era, rediscover myself, and become my old self again once I find that. So somewhere in October, I began my journey in finding my career. I had some leads -- which I was extremely excited about and I was determined to put my all to it. I told myself -- a few years ago I didn't think that I would ever be where I am today with owning a small business, it took some work though and a lot a lot a lot a lot of time but I did make it where I was set out to be. My first lead So there was this event production company that I came across with in 2021 - and I had previously applied to it that year - but didn't get the job, obviously. However, I continued to be connected with them through various freelance opportunities here and there. I worked at a number of events for them and even helped out in the back end with some administrative tasks. I stayed connected with them until now. Around the time that I decided to change my career - they were also hiring for new team members. So I told myself ok, let's go for it. I spend hours and days in between the studio and teaching working on my design deck, cover letter, and resume. The first position that I was applying for was for the "Event Coordinator" position. I submitted an application because I saw it on their website, even way before they started promoting it on social media. I thought "hope this paints me as a proactive person!" Then one day, I noticed that the role got taken down from the website. I panicked and THEN I kid you not as I was panicking I get a text from the CEO, who again I've been in contact with all this time as a freelancer, asking me if I was available to work one of their events in December. I of course said yes, and I also took the opportunity to ask about the job. Apparently, the position was given to one of her contractors and she said "but there's contract positions still open." At this point I was still panicking, and I was like okay yeah I'll apply for the contract but you know what I'll also apply for the other full time position that is RIGHT up my alley. "Executive Assistant" I told myself, okay I've been operating a business for 6 years. I've been assisting my business partners in operating our business for 6 years. The job description was like 50% operations and 40% event planning and so I said okay! let's do this. So I kids you now, I ran, not walked to my laptop. cooked up a new cover letter, and this time I just pasted that cover letter straight in the email and I sent TWO applications. Because I basically wanted to show them hey I just want to work here, I don't care what position you give me. So, eventually I get a reply, like a week later I think. I got scheduled an interview, bing, bang, boom and now we're here. The interview was on December 2nd, 2022. Today is January 3rd, 2022. So it's been a month since I've had the interview, and I still haven't heard back. I'm beginning to lose hope already.

Actually, I started to lose hope even way before Christmas. There was a couple things that happened that just told me like, I don't feel like I'm gonna be the person that they're looking for. Despite and amazing experience and performance that I did for the event that she asked me to work in December, and how great I felt after the interview. I feel like it may just not be a good fit. Friends and partners told me to look around for other opportunities, or think about a backup plan. Which was really difficult to do because I REALLY want this job, and doing that just felt like It was there was no change and that was my reality. It brought me to spiral into a period of depression. Right around the corner of Christmas.... on December 20th, I get an email saying that their team didn't get a chance to sync up and finalize things and she's on the way to Mexico. So she said that they are looking to get back to people early next week after Christmas. However, they also were throwing their anniversary party and the CEO's birthday party that week, so I was personally invited. So Christmas happened and then the next week came in, I was predicting maybe getting a reply on Tuesday - because that's what "early" next week meant to me. Then Tuesday past, nothing.... Wednesday past, and I'm pretty sure they're busy with the anniversary party and if they did meet that day to finalize things, ok I may receive a response that day. Wednesday passes and then it was the next day which was the anniversary party. For sure no reply there, Friday comes and I'm pretty sure, they weren't going to do any work after the party and it was also her birthday. Then the weekend comes, the NEW YEAR comes. and now we're here. Tuesday. Throughout the weekend and yesterday, I finally accepted things. If I really got the job, I felt like it would be such good news that they wouldn't have been able to tell me. It would have been something they mentioned during the anniversary party. but nothing --- So I figured okay, time to move forward. This feels like more of an introduction piece. but that's okay. I feel like this is chapter 1 - I'm currently entering chapter 2. Sending a bunch of applications and getting some replies so we'll see how this era goes. and i'll be back for chapter 2!

[shellys-apprentice]

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@fenixfoxtrot510

@mint-stone

I tagged 243 of my posts in 2022

#madeleine's mic - 22 posts

#anon - 21 posts

#pla spoilers - 17 posts

#my writting - 11 posts

#pokemon sv - 4 posts

#green should have fought gio in frlg and i will die on that hill - 3 posts

#giovanni - 3 posts

#nice - 2 posts

#i'm unfortunately self aware enough to know that if presented with the opportunity to own a litteral firery mare (rapidash) i would take it - 2 posts

#i love this so much - 2 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#i'm unfortunately self aware enough to know that if presented with the opportunity to own a litteral firery mare (rapidash) i would take it

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Hiya! Could I get Giovanni with 🏳️‍🌈, ❤️🩹, 🥖, and 📖 for the ask meme? Thanks so much~!

🏳️‍🌈- Orientation headcanon

Bi but leans more towards women

❤️‍🩹- Angsty headcanon

Periodically he'll find a handkerchief or other belonging that Silver had lost before being taken around the house. He's kept all of them.

🥖- Food headcanon

He's a good cook, but almost no one knows this

📖- AU I’d like to see them in

I have a half baked equestrian au that's probably never gonna go anywhere, but I also think a vampire au would be fun

5 notes - Posted August 1, 2022

#4

I've come to understand that actually the Pokemon fandom doesn't have a clue what they want! They whine about how much they want an jerk rival like Blue or Silver all the time! We get Bede and Melli and they're the worst most annoying characters ever and they hate them!!! And not in an affectionate way like they hate Blue and Silver!

Funny, I thought Bede was Rose's horribly abused son who's worse off than N and Lillie combined /s

I think part of it is that, in a cast of characters singing your praises constantly, the asshole ones will stand out more. And I feel like the older games did a bit less of that. There's at least not like... a chosen one vibe to the player character in Kanto or Johto. Your just a kid who keeps ending up in the wrong place at the wrong time.

(Not to mention bland as hell nice rivals making the mean ones seem even worse)

5 notes - Posted April 21, 2022

#3

I know there's going to be a separate unrelated or loosely related twist "villain" late game because that's just how they're doing things now for whatever reason

But I wish I'd recorded my audible groan of disappointment when I saw Team Star in the trailer

5 notes - Posted September 7, 2022

#2

They will really do anything to replace HMs except letting you ride your own team huh

22 notes - Posted August 3, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Chapters: 1/? Fandom: Pocket Monsters SPECIAL | Pokemon Adventures Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Sakaki | Giovanni & Silver Characters: Silver (Pokemon), Sakaki | Giovanni Additional Tags: Team Rocket (Pokemon), Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Past Torture, Organized Crime, Tags May Change, let's play how much can I make you hate Pryce Summary:

Silver and Green's first attempt at escaping The Mask of Ice failed.

He was quick to ensure there would not be a second.

Years later, a split second of not-fully-snuffed-out rebellion lands Silver in the depths of Team Rocket's headquarters.

23 notes - Posted April 26, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[jakesalablogs]

More Future Talk

Welcome back to my blog here on Tumblr! The blog rolls along with a new and exciting week of content. Today I will be taking a look at the following news story:

NFT Comic Books: The Promise, the Peril, and What The Future Actually Holds

By Jex Exmundo

From: https://nftnow.com/culture/nft-comic-books-and-the-open-future-of-storytelling/

I’m really interested in discussing the future this week. This is my second future focused post for the week and it’s a good one.

NFT storytelling from independent artists may present some issues for fans in the future. The first issue is likely to be confusion. According to Jex Exmundo (2022), “Case in point, let’s look at My Immortal — a piece of Harry Potter fanfiction so universally disliked that some have even speculated it to be an overly elaborate piece of satire lampooning the worst of what fanfiction had to offer. If J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World featured a similar structure to decentralized NFT franchises, then My Immortal would be recognized as actual canon within the franchise. In the real world, this piece did little to diminish the success of the Harry Potter franchise. From a certain subset of the Potterhead community, it may have even added to it. The same can’t be said if the work was actually recognized as a canon entry into the series. Just look at how quickly Game of Thrones seemingly disappeared overnight from the mainstream conversation following the broadly negative reception its final season received.” The decentralized nature of blockchain ledgers and NFTs allow anyone to create content. This will create confusion as to which works are actually consider canon and which are not. (Wikipedia defines canon as “the material accepted as officially part of the story in an individual universe of that story by its fan base”) Without a clear declaration of canon in the blockchain, consumers will be confused by the overwhelming possibilities of story generation.

This is especially true when considering the possibility of the destruction of the original physical comic book. Without the original work, fans may be left wondering if that work has been removed from canon. This is a complex situation worth monitoring in the coming years.

The other future outcome to monitor is the people versus profit aspect of comics. According to Exmundo (2022), “Creativity takes the backseat to profit,” Elf said about his experiences working in traditional media. “It’s the non-creative people at the top who make the final creative decisions. The antidote is to invert that model. What if [the fans and creators] actually got to sit in the creative driver’s seat? What kind of amazing product would you get from that model?” NFTs and blockchain represent the vast potential of a free and open marketplace of ideas. Gatekeepers and intermediaries are no longer a part of the equation. Moving forward, major comic publishers must keep this in mind in order to avoid alienating the intended audiences. The future is still uncertain. However, all parties involved have the opportunity to build something special from the ground up and create a fan-first community.

Be sure to check back here each week for my latest blog entries to stay up to date with the happenings in the industry. Also be sure to visit https://newhouse.syr.edu/ for more information about how you can get involved in this industry