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dovenymph · 3 years

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a film by peter parker

authors note: this was inspired by another thinkerpete tweet that read "peter probably watches the bit from "a film by peter parker" where he's in the car with tony over and over when he misses him" and@peterparkers-bad-youtube-apology’s summer of love prompt list💛💛 also the video edit was made by me so please do not screen record/save and repost it even if you do credit me (also this is unedited so sorry for any typos, i’ll probably go through it sometime this week, i just wanted to post it first)

prompts used: 2. making the backyard/rooftop into a movie theater

my masterlist

warnings: mentions of tony’s death, other than that, nothing but fluff

word count: 3.9k

Peter hated the summer.

Peter hated not having anything to busy himself with; no homework, or academic decathlon, or seeing Ned everyday who could wrap him up in his graphic novel fan theories or the drama in his on and off relationship with Betty. It was petty drama and minor stimulation, but it was something to distract him momentarily. But now Ned was in Aruba with his parents for the entire month which meant Peter had to suffer through the scorching heat of Juy all by himself.

Peter knew he didn’t have to be alone each day, -Aunt May had spent many dinners trying to get him to join her at the movies or the mall, even offering to let him have free reign of the lego store (when he said no to that, she knew he was in worse shape than she thought)- he had a handful of trustworthy and dependable friends he could hang out with for the afternoon like MJ and Betty, or even Flash who had been uncharacteristically nice to Peter ever since he found out he was Spiderman; this having happened only a few weeks after Tony had died and Peter had let him in on his secret to console a sobbing Eugene who, honestly, seemed to be more broken up about the news than Peter was. But even with his expanding friend group, Peter had found the most his body could endure was the contents of his bedroom.

He tried to get back out there after Tony’s passing, he really did, but at the first Iron Man tribute he admired on patrol, his body completely shut down and he swung back home, tears dampening the material of the mask.

So a lonely summer was what Peter submitted himself too, and he’s come to terms with it. He’s rewatched his favorite old shows, started binging some new ones. He’s taken apart and put together his lego death star four times now, each time faster than the last. But he’s been particularly fond of staring out the window. His apartment complex was quite close to the building besides his and he could look down into the backyard everyone had to share. Peter’s building had one as well, but since he was pretty sure he was the only person under 35 who lived there, it went unused.

Next door, there was always a different activity occurring in order for the patrons to beat the heat, and Peter often thought about how easy it would be for him to just go downstairs and introduce himself, and ask to join. It’d really be as simple as that and he’d meet some new people, get a free lunch and a chance to swim in the plastic pool they set up; maybe they’d laugh at his jokes and clap when he did flips, but it was all just a maybe, just in his imagination because his brain never let him wander to far before squandering the idea of getting close to someone again, for if history has taught Peter anything, it's that anything he gets close to, is not meant to stay for long and will be soon snatched away from him in the cruelest of ways.

And this thought is what resigns him to slink back behind his window and pout the day away, as he was doing now, vision blurring as he stared at nothing.

“Hey!”

Peter jumped, his eyes focusing on the target of whoever pelted his window and they landed on your form, slumped against your open windowsill, chin resting on your hand as you gazed back at him.

“Can I help you?” Peter bit back after lifting his window half way, his tone unconsciously laced with annoyance. He really didn’t even notice it anymore since that’s how he’s been speaking to everyone in his life for months now, but when you flinched at his tone, guilt started to creep up his spine.

Before he could ever begin to stumble out an apology, you cut him off “Yeah, is there a reason you stare into my room everyday?”

Peter's face flushed red and he opened and closed his mouth like a fish. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had spoken so bluntly towards him, and honestly, he liked it. He was getting tired of everyone walking on tiptoes around him, he just wanted things to go back to how they were, where he was just Peter Parker, your friendly neighborhood student.

“Or could you at least give me some money for some curtains if you just can’t give up the beautiful view of a concrete wall?”

“S-sorry, I- I didn’t even know you were there.”

Lie.

Peter knew you were there, he always knew when you were there.

Peter Parker isn’t a stalker, though! Sure, he’s gone through some fucked up shit on Earth and in space, so yeah, he wouldn’t call himself the most …sane person he knows, but he really wasn’t a creep. With your buildings being so close and your rooms directly across from one anothers, he was bound to notice you at some point.

And at some point he did. It was the first day of summer and Midtown let out at 12 instead of 3 to mark the occasion, so Peter had been mulling about in his room for quite some time already, thinking about how he heard all his classmates amazing summer plans and how the farthest he was going to go was probably the Thai restaurant down the street, and even that was a maybe. Peter sulked in silence until a couple hours later he heard a door slam closed, thumps from things being tossed on the ground, and a loud groan as he peeked through his windowsill at you who was currently flopped on the bed, window wide open without a care, scrolling on your phone.

At first, he was taken aback by your beauty, a small, small feeling of intrigue spiked his system, but it flew under the radar due to the seemingly everlasting dread that’s been weighing down on Peter's shoulders for months. But he couldn’t look away. You’d been doing nothing but looking at tiktoks mindlessly, occasionally cracking a half smile if a video was particularly amusing, but you still remained cemented to your mattress with no plans on moving anytime soon.

This brought comfort to Peter as he fished his phone out from the bottom of his bag and pulled up Ned’s messages and started to look through the media he sent him, almost two months worth of funny memes and videos that he hadn’t been bothered to look at, and he sat there along with you, aimlessly letting the time pass by. He enjoyed it, knowing he wasn’t really alone in his lazy and distracting behaviors because the pretty neighbor girl was doing just the same.

Ever since then, he’s just been …aware… of your coming and goings. He figured you had a summer job as every other day you were gone for a few hours, a solid shift. But on the days you were home, you also spent it mainly up in your room, every now and then, playing music from your record player, and if he was really lucky, you’d, unknowingly, give him a private concert as you sung out whichever niall horan or ariana grande song struck your fancy that day. He grew quite fond of the music, having added some of the regulars to his own playlist. And he enjoyed knowing you were right there, and he was right here; each of you living your lives, as uneventful as they may be, but you were together in some sort of way.

He’d never spoken to you, the ability of being able to just push his window up and call out to you at any time was what he liked, and each day he thought he’d do it but chickened out, and now it seemed like he’d have to make introductions whether he was ready or not.

“Mmm, right, so you haven’t seen me change or anything like that?” You asked and the content of your question and the inquisitive tone brought a flush to his cheeks.

“N-no! Of course not! I-I’d never do that, why would I even want to look at you? I mean! I don’t think you’re ugly or anything I… I just…”

Peter’s ramblings were cut off with your laugh as it bounced off the summer air and into his room. You were fully leaning out your open window now, and Peter had found himself in the same position, as if he was drawn to you.

“I was only joking with ya, but it's still nice to have the confirmation. I’m Y/N, your neighbor! Obviously.” You trailed off at the end, knowing that information was unnecessary since the boy next door obviously already knew that.

He was like no boy you’d ever seen before, only read about in books. He had a sweet disposition and inviting brown eyes that matched his soft chestnut hair. But he was built like a man, a strong jaw and strong arms. You’d seen him leaving his building everyday on your way to school, and when he’d get dropped off in a big black SUV during the late hours of the night, but he walked in the opposite direction or darted inside so fast,you never really got a chance to take him in.

“…Peter?” His tentative tone snapped you out of your daze and you realized he was introducing himself.

“Sorry, Peter! I- I… got distracted… by your… death star!” You let out, eyes focusing on the black and grey figure resting on his bed.

Peter felt his cheeks heat up as he moved to push it to the ground.

“That’s pretty cool! I finished the star wars series last summer.”

Peter’s eyes snapped up to yours and the friendly smile you were giving him along with the genuine interest in your tone seemed to break something inside him, snapped the band of hesitation that wrapped around his heart. “You did? For the first time?”

“Yeah! I know I’m like super late, but there’s like nine movies!”

Your laughs melded into one as you leaned out your respective windows and began talking about your favorite movie series. Peter was aware that this was unnatural for him. He had been more open to this stranger in the past few minutes than he had to his own Aunt in months and the same guilt from earlier crept up on him. But Peter was having a good time talking to you and he felt his insides turn in excitement when he realized you really had no idea who he was. He had a clean slate with you and he could make any first impression he wanted, well he hoped your first impression of him wasn’t that he was a peeping pervert, but we move, as MJ would say.

You were about to start telling Peter about this new dystopian novel you began reading when you heard a woman call out to him.

“Oh, that’s my Aunt May. She must be home from work. I- I should go say hello.” He explained, a sad look crossing his face that you didn’t quite understand.

You felt your own sadness wash over you, though. You didn’t want to stop talking to Peter either. “Yeah, of course!”

“But we can talk tomorrow right?” Peter asked, his tone laced with uncertainty.

“Oh well, I work double tomorrow… so I probably won’t be home ‘til late.” You said and the way the brown haired boys face visibly fell felt like a punch in the gut and you were scrambling for a reason to make him smile.

“B-but hey! I also get paid tomorrow so if you want, you can come over on saturday and we can have a movie night and we can order a shit ton of take out?”

“Come over to your place?” Peter asked, and he felt himsef involuntarily tense at the idea of leaving his room for the first time in weeks. It was safe in his room. But the pleading look on your face and hopefulness in your tone encouraged him to take the chance.

“I’d love to y/n.” Peter said with a soft smile and you smiled back shyly at him before closing your window and making your way out your room, making sure you were safe in the hall, away from his prying eyes to do a little happy dance.

Peter was unable to wipe the grin off his face as he walked out his room to greet his Aunt.

She heard his feet padding down the hall as she was setting out dinner, “Sorry its not ready yet, Petey, today’s been crazy, but I’ll get started now.” She rushed. Recently, she’s been hoping food’s the key to lift her poor nephews spirits, so each night she’ll either order or make something more fattening, cheesy, and delicious than the last.

“It’s alright May,” Peter let out easily as he turned the counter and placed a kiss on her cheek, “why don’t you let me cook tonight?”

May’s jaw dropped and she blinked a couple times. She could barely get two words out of Peter recently, and they were always either a meak thank you for dinner or an it was good when she asked about his day. She felt her eyes tear up at the slight sliver of her old Petey back.

“O-oh, really, you wanna cook?”

Peter ducked his head down at the ingredients in front of him to avoid looking in her eyes, his heart dropping at the glossiness that overtook them. He truly hadn’t realized how closed off he’d been. “Well, how about we do it together?” He began and the face splitting grin that spread across May’s face was all he needed to know he was taking a step in the right direction.

“G-good idea, honey. Can’t have the house burn down, can we?”

“Hey!”

May laughed and kissed Peter’s head as they began winding through the kitchen, making casual conversation. It was just like the old days, May thought. Before the wave of devastation drowned Peter as he lost a father figure, once again.

“So what did you do today, P? Do you know when Ned get’s back? I’m sure you’re both excited to see each other.”

“Oh, uh, yeah, I am. I don’t know when he get’s back actually, but that’s okay-“

“I know you like your peace and quiet, I really do, but I do think it’ll be good for you to get out of the apartment for a little bit, see if Michelle is available. Oh! Or maybe that Lisa, Liz! I liked Liz, see if she’s available-“

“May! Its okay. I don’t need to hang out with Liz Allen,” Peter grumbled, “I- I made a new friend actually.”

May looked over at Peter in confusion since he hadn’t gone out or had anyone over in weeks, that she could remember; and Peter took her silence as an opportunity to continue.

“The neighbor.”

“Mrs. Wozniak?”

“No! Y/n, she lives in the next building over. And my room is right across from hers. We’re gonna hang out on saturday.”

“Oh?” May raised her brows at her nephew and bit back a smile, much to Peter’s chagrin. “Is she pretty?”

“And that’s relevant why?”

“I don’t know!!” May drawled and Peter just rolled his eyes and kept chopping the vegetables in front of him, the blush adorning his cheeks refusing to go down as he thought yes, yes she is.

.・゜゜・　　・゜゜・．

You yanked the door open as soon as you heard Peter’s knocks against it. He jumped back a bit, his arm still partially raised from when he knocked and you silently berated yourself for being so eager, but the spreading smile across his face made you feel not so bad.

“Oh, sorry, I was just-“

“It’s alright.” Peter replied with a soft smile, and you let yourself trace the golden flecks in his eyes before he cleared his throat, once again, snapping you out of a daze. You seemed to be in a dreamy state around him alot.

“Can I come in? I brought my Star Wars DVD collection by the way, I know you’ve seen them, but this one has the director's cut which I thought totally changed the course of the first trilogy!” Peter explained, rocking on the balls of his feet in excitement.

You bit your lip at the sight, his cuteness was rubbing off on you. “Yeah, that sounds great, but actually we aren’t gonna be watching in here.” You said, grabbing the bag of Chinese food and snacks and stepping out.

Peter’s face sputtered as you both walked to the stairs. He’d spent all day building up his courage to just go six feet from his building, there was no way he’d be able to go around the city with you for the fear of seeing something that’ll remind him of the avengers or crime.

“Y’alright?” You asked, noticing Peter’s stony silence as you walked down the last flight and made your way to the back gate.

“Yeah, sorry, I guess I’m just nervous. I haven’t really hung out with anyone new in a while, well, with anyone at all really.”

You smiled in sympathy, “I get you, I haven’t either. All my friends are out of town, so I’ve mostly just hung out in my room, too.”

“But you already knew that, don’t ya stalker?”

Peter rolled his eyes and shoved your arm as you laughed, glad you got his nerves out of his system. You unlocked the gate and lef Peter to the back garden.

“Woah..” Peter let out. There was a large white sheet hung up between two trees, and a projector set up on the table behind where a blanket lay, covered in a mess of pillows. The setting sun lit up by strung lightbulbs.

“You like? I figured since we both seemed to be home bodies, we could have the fun of the movie theatre, but here!”

Peter felt his heart swell at your words. You’d only known him for two days, and you already treated him with so much consideration and kindness. “I- I love it, y/n. This is amazing.”

He saw how you tucked your cheek into your shoulder in bashfulness and felt his spirits raise even higher. You were adorable.

“I’m glad you like it. I hope the projector works though, it took me forever to translate the instructions.”

Peter walked over to it and gave it a once over. “It seems fine to me, but I can always look at it if you want.”

“Oh yeah? You good with tech?”

“Good enough to get by. I needed it a lot while working with Mr. Stark” Peter began, forgetting that he wasn’t talking to an old friend.

“You worked with Tony Stark?!?”

“Oh.. oh yeah, only for a little! I was an intern.” He said quietly, beating himself up for even bringing up the topic of Tony. The last thing he wanted to do was cry in front of a pretty girl.

“Wow, that must’ve been amazing. You, you must miss him a lot then, huh?”

“Yeah,” he chuckled lifelessly. “Yeah I do.”

“But no matter, we’re here to have a good time right?”

“Yeah, yeah we are!” You grasped his hand and gave him a sympathetic squeeze -neither of you blind to the sparks that shot from the place your hands met- and got settled on the blanket.

Two and a half moves later, the sun had set and the two of you were sitting in the darkness, the only light coming from the flickering of the projector as the abandoned movie played. You and Peter were sitting cross legged, facing each other as he told you another story about working with the Avengers.

“Yeah, it was so crazy!! We were in this airport and he went from being like two inches tall to two hundred feet, it blew my mind. But it was okay though, because I had this idea-“

“Wait, wait, wait. You were there? Why?” You asked, loving every adventure filled anecdote he told you, but it wasn’t all adding up. For just an intern, he seemed incredibly close to Mr. Stark himself, but then again, you’d only known him for less than a week and you also wanted to go everywhere with him.

Peter worried his lip, thinking about how he could worm his way out of this one. Why would a teenage intern be at the Avengers civil war? He figured he could lie, or even just run away and buy black out curtains. Maybe he could convince Aunt May to switch rooms with him even. But you’d already brought so much light to his life in multiple aspects, and he thought, just maybe, you’d be able to bring light to that aspect of his life too.

“You know what, lemme just show you! Wait here, I’ll be back!”

Peter ran back down, his Chewbacca flash drive in hand, adrenaline running through his veins. He plugged it into your laptop and dug up a folder he hadn’t touched in almost eight months.

“What’s this?” You asked as he sat back down next to you.

“You’ll see.” He said, eyes glued to the screen in front of him.

A Film by Peter Parker, read the title as a compilation of videos featuring Peter, Happy, Aunt May, the Avengers, and Tony projected before you both.

Peter heard you gasp as the camera flashed to the suit, and saw, from the corner of his eye, how your head snapped towards his as he backspringed across the battleground. The film continued and neither of you could tear your eyes from the screen. Peter felt his eyes well up with tears as a scene with him and Tony talking to the camera began and he thought that watching this was a bad idea and he was about to turn around and turn it off when he felt your fingers intertwine with his.

He sucked in a sharp breath at the warmth you brought him and he squeezed back, his brain nearly malfunctioning at the speed in which he tried to memorize the feel of your hand in his. But his senses were overloaded as he picked up on your accelerated heartbeat.

The two of you continued to watch the video, neither moving even when it autostarted from the beginning, and this time you laughed outwardly at the funny parts, and asked him questions about why Happy didn’t seem to like him.

“What did you do to him Peter?”

“Nothing I swear!”

“Likely story.”

And he felt the steel blanket of grief fall off his shoulders. The feeling of intrigue and excitement for going back to life was no longer a small trail buried deep within him, but now a firecracker that ignited his insides and aurated off of him. Things were going to be alright, he was going to make it out this summer with more than just the memories from his bedroom, and he’d make it through whatever else life would throw at him, as long as he had you by his side.

Because you didn’t make his heart beat faster out of fear, you made him feel flustered and full of affection.

And you didn’t hold him roughly, with the intent to harm him; you held him delicately, and he could only wait to be able to hold your heart the same way.

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fabianocolucci · 3 years

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Can we have one lighthearted and optimistic show or movie for once?

Hello, I am writing this post because I have read that the CW is making a TV show about the PowerPuff Girls, except they’re going to be depicted as “20-somethings who are disillusioned after having spent their childhood fighting crime”.

Reading that angered me, I have to admit it, because this is just the latest of a never ending series of shows and movies that try to take something that is supposed to be lighthearted, funny and optimistic and turn it into something dark and edgy about how much life sucks, trying to highlight that “we live in a society” and so on.

Riverdale is the example many people come up with most of the time, and I can see why: its shared universe (which includes The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) is a textbook example of how Hollywood keeps handling these things. However, what many people fail to realize is that this trend has been going on since long before the CW took Archie Andrews and the others and tried to be as dark and edgy as they can.

When Batman Begins proved to be a huge hit, and it was followed by an even greater hit (The Dark Knight), Hollywood apparently thought that the reason of its success was that it tried to be darker and edgier. However, those things worked only because Christopher Nolan wanted to take a popular superhero and tried to depict him in a more realistic tone (after all, their movies may be even darker than what Batman is supposed to be, unless you take in consideration any Batman comic written by Frank Miller).

Since then, we’ve seen countless movies, games and shows that tried to be so dark they’ve become bleak and, honestly, even a bit bland.

On the superhero side, we’ve seen multiple depictions where, for instance, Superman has become evil and is now a force that needs to be stopped (they even made a movie about this being a possibility, as if it’s inevitable), while we’ve seen at least four live-action depictions of Batman being a killer hero who has lost his vision and hope (to the point where Batwoman casually mentioning how Batman has a no killing code was enough to make that world’s Batman a lighter version than what is the current trend). The Netflix shows about Marvel superheroes even made it look like the Avengers’ arrival caused nothing but problems for New York (admittedly, they kind of have to depict New York this way, otherwise it would feel weird how there’s so many superheroes in that city and yet crime is still a thing).

On the fantasy side, because of Game of Thrones’ success, now every fantasy TV show wants to emulate it, and as such we have bleak, humorless worlds where there’s a lot of darkness, with constant “mature” content like swearing and sex (The Witcher is a great show, but they could have toned it down a bit, in that context). It’s like even a genre whose name is literally “fantasy” can’t escape in trying to depict a more gritty and real world where everything always has to be dark.

On the science fiction side, well, we’ve seen the new Star Wars movie, which took the ending of Episode VI, which was full of optimism and hope, and basically said “nope, everything now is so dark and lonely”. I guess one of the reasons why you could pretend the sequel trilogy never happened is that, well, they end with a more positive note than whatever happened after episode IX.

On the TV side, there isn’t just Riverdale or the upcoming PowerPuff Girls show. The Winx Saga has taken away all the color of the cartoon (no, seriously: everything is so grey and soulless looking in the TV show that someone may have to tell you they’re supposed to be The Winx Club in live action). The Nancy Drew show now is a dark mystery more in line with Riverdale actually. Netflix is making an Avatar show and apparently they want to age up the characters “so that they can have sex” (which somewhat implies that there’s someone who looked at 12 year old Aang or 14 year old Katara and thought “I want to see them have sex”, which is so creepy and disturbing that I even regret pointing it out).

This would not be such a big deal if there wasn’t the fact that we’re talking about the vast majority of big movies and shows! Even something funny like Lost in Space has been turned into a dark remake.

Why is it so hard to find something in Hollywood that doesn’t try to be dark and depressing? Well, I think there are multiple reasons, which I’m going to point out:

· There is this idea among writers that drama is the only thing that keeps the plot interesting. Characters need to have tragedies thrown at them all the time, they constantly have to fight and (usually) heavens forbid if they even try to lighten up a bit. This is, of course, wrong, as shown by how many fanfiction writers take characters who have a life made of day-by-day drama and depict them in quiet scenes like them making a meal for their beloved or just going to a vacation where they can relax. Just because depicting nothing but quiet and peaceful moments can become boring on the long run, doesn’t mean it can never happen;

· Because we live in dark times, then everything has to be dark. It’s as if people can’t experience any sort of hopeful escapism when out there it seems like nothing but tragedies and negativity occurs outside of their windows. Illnesses, war, deaths, recessions and so on happen 24/7, so how can you showcase even a bit of positivity? Well, I have one question: what kind of escapism would constantly remind you of the very thing you are trying to temporarily escape from? If I want to forget about the World’s problems for an hour, then why on Earth are you making me think about them? Who decided that the best way of forgetting that life sucks is to have your story say “life sucks” all the time? I don’t understand;

· Writers are probably influenced by the “loser culture” on the internet. I mean, wherever you go on social media, people seem to have a race to see who has the most miserable life. Many comic artist have their characters experience all sorts of problems and negativity, there’s a lot of memes about negative stuff (how many times have you seen a wholesome post with a reblog or a retweet adding something negative? For example, I don’t know, someone tweets “I asked my mom a puppy, she brought me five of them” and someone says “if I asked it to my mom, she’d bring five slaps to my butt”). Of course, if I, a writer, see that people can’t stop talking about how much their life suck, I would think “well, maybe that’s all they want to hear about” and make characters with miserable lives;

However, I have always noticed how there’s a medium who seems to not be easily affected by all this stuff: animation.

You want a fantasy show where everything is colorful and bright? There’s lots of cartoons for that.

You want to see superheroes doing their best to fight for the good of the World? There’s plenty of them in animation.

You want hope and positivity? Tune in on any station that airs cartoons and you will find it.

However, the problem is that this goes hand to hand with the old stigma that, well, “cartoons are for kids”, so it feels like movies and TV shows are saying “positivity and happiness are for children. Grow the hell up and see how dark and hopeless the World truly is!”.

Why is trying to be positive and optimistic something that can’t happen if you’re a mature person? Why is it so wrong to just want to see a bit of peace in these media?

I don’t know what else to say or to add, so it’s best if I finish my post right here. So, here’s my opinion:

Even though it is okay for you to tell me a story where nothing matters, where “we live in a society” and where you can’t have good things, it should be balanced with something. Have you ever seen the Yin Yang symbol? Why do you think it depicts darkness with a little bit of light? Because nothing can be completely dark. So, just try to add some good energy in your story. It won’t be an issue for anybody to just have one moment where everyone smiles.

#darker and edgier #dark and gritty #dark TV shows #edgy #positivity #why is everything so dark #optimism #Riverdale #PowerPuff Girls #PPG CW #CW #Game of Thrones #superheroes #happiness #hope

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seriousbusinessforhumans · 3 years

Link

Feb 2018

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) counted over 100 people killed or injured by alleged perpetrators influenced by the so-called "alt-right" — a movement that continues to access the mainstream and reach young recruits.

On December 7, 2017, a 21-year-old white male posing as a student entered Aztec High School in rural New Mexico and began firing a handgun, killing two students before taking his own life. At the time, the news of the shooting went largely ignored, but the online activity of the alleged killer, William Edward Atchison, bore all the hallmarks of the “alt-right”—the now infamous subculture and political movement consisting of vicious trolls, racist activists, and bitter misogynists.

But Atchison wasn’t the first to fit the profile of alt-right killer—that morbid milestone belongs to Elliot Rodger, the 22-year-old who in 2014 killed seven in Isla Vista, California, after uploading a sprawling manifesto filled with hatred of young women and interracial couples (Atchison went by “Elliot Rodger” in one of his many online personas and lauded the “supreme gentleman,” a title Rodger gave himself and has since become a meme on the alt-right).

Including Rodger’s murderous rampage there have been at least 13 alt-right related fatal episodes, leaving 43 dead and more than 60 injured (see list). Nine of the 12 incidents counted here occurred in 2017 alone, making last year the most violent year for the movement.

Like Atchison and Rodger, these perpetrators were all male and, with the exception of three men, all under the age of 30 at the time they are alleged to have killed. The average age of the alt-right killers is 26. The youngest was 17. One, Alexandre Bissonnette, is Canadian, but the rest are American.

The “alternative right” was coined in part by white nationalist leader Richard Bertrand Spencer in 2008, but the movement as it’s known today can largely be traced back to 2012 and 2013 when two major events occurred: the killing of the black teenager Trayvon Martin and the so-called Gamergate controversy where female game developers and journalists were systematically threatened with rape and death. Both were formative moments for a young generation of far-right activists raised on the internet and who found community on chaotic forums like 4chan and Reddit where the classic tenets of white nationalism — most notably the belief that white identity is under attack by multiculturalism and political correctness — flourish under dizzying layers of toxic irony.

The Killings Started in California

The timeline for alt-right killers began on May 23, 2014.

On that day, college sophomore Elliot Rodger stabbed his three roommates to death before driving to a sorority house at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and shooting several women. He then killed or injured several pedestrians with both gunfire and his vehicle before exchanging fire with police and eventually taking his own life. He ultimately killed seven and wounded 14.

Rodger left behind a sprawling 107,000-word manifesto titled, “My Twisted World: The Story of Elliot Rodger,” which contained passages lamenting his inability to find a girlfriend, expressing extreme misogyny and various racist positions including disgust for interracial couples (despite the fact that he was multi-racial himself (half-Chinese)).

“How could an inferior, ugly black boy be able to get a white girl and not me? I am beautiful, and I am half white myself,” Rodger wrote. “I am descended from British aristocracy. He is descended from slaves.”

Rodger frequented PUAhate, a deeply misogynistic forum populated by failed “pick up artists” dedicated to revealing, “the scams, deception, and misleading marketing techniques used by dating gurus and the seduction community to deceive men and profit from them.” Discussions about women on the forum are at best objectifying and at worst, violent.

The term, “white sharia,” allegedly coined by Sacco Vandal of the popular alt-right site Vandal Void, is a radical response to Patrick Buchanan’s argument in Death of the West: that the increase in immigration and decline of white birthrates is leading to the end of Western civilization. Rodger’s celebration at the 504um, one of the premier alt-right forums, is the rule rather than the exception, and locates misogyny at the core of the alt-right.

Andrew Anglin, the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer’s founder and chief propagandist, has his own troubling history of vicious misogyny, tracking all the way back to high school.

In the aftermath of Rodger’s killing spree, a user at 4chan/b/ posted a photo from Rodger’s Facebook page with the note, “Elliot Rodger, the supreme gentleman, was part of /b/. Discuss.” This sentiment was echoed by other /b/ users who found similarities between his lexicon and that of the noxious board, including the term “beta,” used by men online to describe themselves as lacking the physicality, charisma and confidence associated with alpha males.... The term resurfaced on 4chan/r9k/ in the wake of a shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, by Chris Harper-Mercer, who killed nine and wounded at least seven others at the college on October 1, 2015. “This is only the beginning. The Beta Rebellion has begun,” one anonymous user wrote. “Soon, more of our brothers will take up arms to become martyrs to this revolution.”

Although never proven, it is widely speculated that Harper-Mercer was a user on the board as warnings against attending school the following day that circulated on the eve of the shooting. Authorities believe Harper-Mercer, who like Rodger was multi-racial, was also motivated by white supremacist ideas. The Government Accountability Office categorized the Roseburg killings as “white supremacist” in an April 2017 report.

2017: A Year of Alt-Right Violence

The first killing in 2017 that can be tied to the alt-right occurred on January 29 in Canada. A 27-year-old university student named Alexandre Bissonnette allegedly brought a semiautomatic rifle into the Islamic Cultural Centre of Quebec City and shot and killed six worshippers while injuring 19—two critically.

On May 20, 2017, Sean Urbanski, a 22-year-old University of Maryland student, allegedly stabbed and killed newly commissioned Lt. Richard Collins, III. Authorities described the attack as “totally unprovoked.” Urbanski approached Collins, who was black, and two friends at 3 a.m., seemingly intoxicated, and said, “Step left, step left if you know what’s best for you.” When Collins refused, Urbanski stabbed him. Urbanski, however, was a member of a Facebook group called “Alt Reich: Nation”.

Less than a week later, Jeremy Christian, a 35-year-old Portland resident, allegedly stabbed and killed two people and severely wounded another passenger on a train while they were defending two young women from his anti-Muslim and racist remarks. Christian, who identified as a white nationalist and had a history of violence and mental illness, had a Facebook page filled with racist and bizarre political content. Witnesses at an alt-right free speech rally in the month preceding the stabbing saw Christian wearing an American flag cape, yelling racial slurs and making Nazi salutes.

Two months later, on July 14, 2017, Lane Maurice Davis, 33, allegedly stabbed his father, Charles Davis, to death at the family home in Skagit County, Washington, after accusing his father of pedophilia. Davis, a conspiracy theory obsessive who went by the name ‘Seattle4Truth’ online and accused his father, not based on his own experience, but instead on his belief that liberals around the world are participating in secret pedophilia rings. Davis was reportedly a researcher for Milo Yiannopoulos and claimed to have ghost written pieces on Breitbart News for the former tech editor.

In the months leading up to Unite the Right, members of the alt-right colonized and organized themselves on the gaming chat platform Discord. This includes Auernheimer who was a frequent participant in the Daily Stormer’s server, “Thunderdome,” where he regularly interacted with site readers and put out calls for action.

Young, White, Angry, Male

According to Dr. Eric Madfis, author of a 2014 paper on the intersectional identities of American Mass Murderers, young, white, middle class, heterosexual males commit mass murder at a disproportionately high rate relative to their population size in the United States.

The rate of mass murders spiked in the 1970s and 1990s. Between 1966 and 1999, there were 95 cases of mass public shootings. Between 1976 and 2008, mass murders occurred roughly twice per month, claiming an average of 125 deaths each month. A more recent study published by Mother Jones identifies 95 mass shootings in the United States since 1982. Of those, 55 (59%) were committed by white men.

FBI crime data suggests that ages 16 to 24 are peak time for violent crime. According to Dr. Pete Simi, Director of the Earl Babbie Research Center at Chapman University, "This is a period of substantial transition in an individual's life, when they're less likely to have significant attachments in their life that deter them from criminal violence."

Madfis’s 2014 paper from the University of Washington investigates the role of intersectional identities in mass murder incidents and argues that young, white males' unique downward social mobility, relative to his expectations, accounts for their overrepresentation as perpetrators of mass murder.

Only one in five mass murderers are “likely psychotic or delusional,” however, according to Dr. Michael Stone, a forensic psychiatrist at Columbia University.

A 2001 study conducted by Meloy examining 34 adolescent perpetrators of mass murder found that 59% were the direct result of a triggering event. That rate jumped to 90% among adult mass murders.

Dr. Elliott Leyton, an expert on serial homicide, argues that contemporary mass murderers often target the perceived source of lost financial stability or class prestige. The alt-right, which couches its mission in terms of surviving literal extinction, routinely laments so-called reverse racism and affirmative action as well as immigration in all its forms.

The grievances collected by those motivated by the white nationalist ideology at the heart of the alt-right often do not begin with racist propaganda, but rather in the toxic communities of the men's rights movement... The age-old racist argument - that black men are 'taking our women' — is made regularly. Racist slurs are chucked around casually. There seems to be a significant overlap with organised white supremacy."

Andrew Anglin once wrote “[o]ur target audience [for the neo-nazi website Daily Stormer] is white males between the ages of 10 and 30.”

Wiring Young Neurons

“Our target audience is white males between the ages of 10 and 30,” Anglin wrote in his “PSA: When the Alt-Right Hits the Street, You Wanna be Ready.” “I include children as young a ten, because an element of this is that we want to look like superheroes. We want to be something that boys fantasize about being a part of. That is a core element to this. I don’t include men over the age of 30, because after that point, you are largely fixed in your thinking. We will certainly reach some older men, but they should not be a focus.”

[Richard] Spencer told Mother Jones in December of 2016 before a contentious speaking engagement at Texas A&M University. “I think you do need to get them while they are young. I think rewiring the neurons of someone over 50 is effectively impossible.”

Undeniably, their efforts have had success. Mainstay racist conferences, like the annual gatherings of American Renaissance and the National Policy Institute, are attracting larger audiences, no longer dominated by their once singular demographic of middle-aged white men.

On a panel at Harvard University in October, Derek Black, son of longtime white supremacist Don Black, who once represented the future of the movement until he renounced racism during college, described his surprise at seeing so many young participants in Charlottesville:

I can say for sure my entire life in white nationalism I went to conferences many times a year. I spoke at them. I tried to organize them. I organized online through my dad's site [Stormfront] through organizations whether Jared [Taylor]'s AmRen or David [Duke]'s EURO or Council of Conservative Citizens … Everybody at these things is gray-haired. Me and two other people would be under 40. That was it. Which is partly why I took this impression that this is not gonna last. And a lot of that is because young people have a lot to lose … Young people who show up to a rally like that are going to get their identities exposed online and then it's gonna be hard for them to get jobs … I cannot actually explain what changed. The one striking thing about Charlottesville…was there's a ton of young kids like college-age or actual college students who got on buses and went to this who I don't think had been to an event like that before.

Alt-right groups such as Identity Evropa and Vanguard America are marketing themselves exclusively to college and high school-aged individuals.

Then, on October 19, barely two months after the chaos of Charlottesville, the University of Florida was forced to host a Spencer speaking engagement under threat of a lawsuit........................ Hours later, three of his supporters were arrested for attempted murder after an alleged confrontation with protestors in which Spencer’s supporters threw stiff-armed salutes and one fired a shot at the urging of his accomplices.

Not Even 21

James Alex Fields was only 20 years-old when he drove his Dodge Challenger into a crowd of attendees and protestors during August’s Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, injuring 19 and killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer. Fields stood with members of Vanguard America during the rally and carried a shield with the militaristic, alt-right group’s insignia on it.

According to police records, Fields also had a troubling history of childhood domestic violence — which experts see in about 1 in 6 mass killers. In 2010, Field’s mother called 911 after he attacked her for telling him to stop playing a video game. Other records reveal that he brandished a 12-inch knife at her on a separate occasion. His disabled mother uses a wheelchair.

Just three months prior to Unite the Right, another young, white man with a history in the alt-right, 18-year-old Devon Arthurs, allegedly killed two of his roommates... in Florida. Arthurs, who was taken into custody by authorities after holding employees of a tobacco shop hostage, had converted to Salafism, an ultraconservative form of Sunni Islam, and begun defending ISIS online a year prior. He was previously a leader of a National Socialist group known as the Atomwaffen (“Atomic Weapon”) Division which formed on the fascist forum Iron March.

In the year leading up to the shooting, Arthurs appeared to be blending his alt-right beliefs with his newfound adherence to extremist forms of Islam. His username changed from Weissewolfe to Kekman Al-Amriki, a combination of the trollish god of “meme magic” common to 4chan and the name of an American member of al-Shabab, an Islamic militant organization. According to VICE, Arthurs also spoke of “white sharia,” a concept exemplifying the brutal, misogynistic core attitudes of the alt-right and those it has inspired to violence.

Leaderless Resistance

In 2014, after longtime Klansman Frazier Glenn Miller Jr. killed three at a Jewish community center and a retirement home in Overland Park, Kansas, Brad Griffin of Occidental Dissent published an article on the topic of “self detonating lone wolf vanguardists.” According to Griffin, “a ‘self detonating lone wolf vanguardist’ is someone who is radically alienated from society and who has given up on persuasion, a fanatacist who is inclined toward violent methods of bringing about eschatological political change, who usually acts alone or with an accomplice in the name of a movement without the support of assistance of any group, and who typically explodes, lashes out, or ‘self detonates’ without warning in rampage shootings, murder-suicides, and bombing campaigns.”

In its just over four years of operation, the Daily Stormer’s audience included at least three readers who were either convicted or indicted for murder.

"An Age of Ultraviolence"

On June 17, 2015, Dylann Storm Roof killed nine African-American worshipers and wounded one while attending a Bible study class at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Roof, then 21, told his victims, including Reverend and State Senator Clementa Pickney, that, “I have to do it. You rape our women and you’re taking over our country, and you have to go.”

In a manifesto posted to his website, lastrhodesian.com, Roof cited the Trayvon Martin case as his inspiration for searching on Google for “black on White crime.” According to Roof, “I have never been the same since that day. The first website I came to was the Council of Conservative Citizens. There were pages upon pages of these brutal black on White murders. I was in disbelief.”

On March 22, 2017, another Daily Stormer reader, James Harris Jackson, was arrested after stabbing 66-year-old black man Timothy Caughman with a sword in Manhattan. Jackson, an army veteran, was 28 at the time of the alleged stabbing. He travelled to New York from Baltimore, Maryland, to conduct a “practice run” for what was intended to deter white women from race-mixing. He told a media source after his arrest that, “the white race is being eroded.”

On Friday, December 27, a 17-year-old white male, reported to be Nicholas Giampa, allegedly shot and killed the parents of his ex-girlfriend in Reston, Virginia, before turning the gun on himself. According to reports, the parents had facilitated the break-up after learning that Giampa held neo-Nazi beliefs.

Giampa’s account also attempted to engage with those of alt-right leaders and organizations like Mike Peinovich, VDARE, the Traditionalist Worker Party, Identity Evropa, as well as Vanguard America, the neo-Nazi group that James Fields was photographed with in Charlottesville. One of Giampa’s main obsessions, however, was the hardcore neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen.

2018 is already off to a disturbing start. On January 2, Blaze Bernstein, a college student who was gay and Jewish went missing and was later found murdered. Friends of the accused murderer, Samuel Woodward, told ProPublica that Woodward was a committed neo-Nazi and member of Atomwaffen which may have as chapters in as many as eight states.

This former Atomwaffen member also said that the events in Charlottesville had a major impact on the group. Its membership doubled.

(selected sections of article)

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amphtaminedreams · 3 years

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Spring/Summer & Haute Couture Week 2021: Whoops, I’ve Missed a Loooot (Part 2)

Hey to anyone reading,

I’m so sorry for the gap between the last fashion week review post and this one! Argh. I had no idea I posted it as long ago as the beginning of March but I think we can all agree that lockdown has fucked with our perceptions of time completely. I wish I could say the delay in posting was as simple as me being busy but I’ve also started to reflect on whether or not I want to carry on this format of posts for the time being; on the scale of problems, this one is wayyy down there in the very lower quartile of the first world region, but my motivation to carry on this kind of content in the form of long-winded text posts is...meh...not so much there anymore. At first I was thinking the issue was that working on these was my last priority on my daily to-do lists but as I’ve got back into writing fiction, it’s kind of occurred to me that the fact I was putting these posts on my to-do lists in the first place along with things like doing the ironing and contacting student finance speaks volumes. When I’m back from work or winding down, opening up Tumblr and coming back to this draft isn’t something that I think of as a fun stress reliever in the way drafting stories is. It doesn’t feel like I’m using my imagination or my creativity or expressing myself in any way and it’s not much of an escape from day to day life in the way that writing dialogue or exploring characters is. Maybe it’s because I’ve done quite a few of these posts now but I just tend to feel like I’m repeating myself, you know kinda like when you’re writing an essay and trying to fill up a word count; of course there are collections that I do have a lot of opinions on but by and large, sometimes it boils down to THESE CLOTHES ARE JUST FUCKING PRETTY, OKAY?! There’s only so many things you can say about a tulle skirt or an exaggerated collar before you want to strangle yourself with said tulle. I used to think iF VoGUe RuNwaY wRitErs CaN dO iT WhAT's MY exCusE until I realised that 1). Vogue Runway writers actually get paid and 2). for the most part all they do is explain the designer's intentions behind the collections verbatim without giving a critical opinion anyway.

I think a lot of the pressure I feel to justify what are in reality quite simple observations and opinions goes back to some of the feelings I explained in my first ever fashion week review where people who know more about fashion and have a formal education in the subject tend to be kind of gatekeep-y and elitist. It can never be that you appreciate different things about a collection but rather than one of you has taste and the other doesn’t and if it wasn’t obvious, the taste level assigned to you by the powers that be tend to positively correlate with the amount of money you have available to spend on a degree that has a reputation for failing to provide a steady income, which for most makes it an unrealistic avenue to pursue. I know, I know, the pressure is totally self-inflicted and wholly imagined seeing as I have under 500 followers on here and those who do interact with these posts most likely do so for the pictures but I still feel it, and given that I’m going to have enough external pressure to write essays when I return to uni in September, why on earth am I wasting time putting it on myself? When just posting photosets of my favourite looks is not only actually enjoyable for me but is also what other people WANT to see too? Nobody wants to read a self-indulgent paragraph like this when they’re here for the clothes and to be honest, for the most part I don’t want to write them anyway unless it’s something I have strong feelings about or if a collection can only be properly appreciated with analysis. I think I’ve made pretty clear which designers I’m a fan of, do you really need to hear me raving about Gucci or Zimmerman or Miu Miu or Balenciaga again? Is there gonna be anything revolutionary in yet another rant about Maria Grazia? Course not. I mean, if you are reading, you might have to witness those things one last time because I do intend to finish off this season’s review in this format for consistency purposes and because I’ve already got all the notes now but on the whole, I doubt anyone will miss my rambles.

So, with all that in mind, I think after I finish my S/S21 posts I am gonna start just uploading these posts without the written part. I mean, for one, the simplicity of doing this means I’m much less likely to procrastinate making them which in turn means I’ll be able to get them out right after the shows as a kind of summary as opposed to months later when they’re no longer as relevant. This will also give me more time to work on the writing I actually enjoy. Right now I’m going through and editing my 17 year old self’s “grown-up” take on the Pretty Little Liars blackmail murder mystery style plot line which I wrote back when I was completely and utterly obsessed with the show and bitterly disappointed by the last couple of seasons. The writing is pretty mediocre and often hugely cringey to read back now but I am still a fan of the basic plot and I’m genuinely motivated to see if I can make it something actually worth reading, and to get onto that ASAP; this feels especially important right now given that the HBO version of the series’ apparent upcoming release has sent that ever-present writer’s fear of seeing-your-same-storyline-done-better-by-somebody-else-thus-forever-relegating-your-version-to-being-the-poor-imitation-so-you-gotta-get-there-first into overdrive (or maybe that’s just me and my neuroses). Again, it’s a totally unfounded fear based on the fact that the HBO show will probs get millions of viewers whilst I will be doing little more than shouting into the void but anybody who’s used Turnitin to submit an essay that ultimately counts for little more than like 1% of your grade or degree will know that no matter how irrelevant your work is, the concept of failing a plagiarism check, be it via a computer algorithm or one random stranger on the internet’s assessment, is enough to conjure visions of the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse galloping towards you screaming “START THE WHOLE THING AGAIN” before releasing a hoarde of 2015 Chanel vs. Walmart style comparison memes.

Now, speaking of Chanel, I should probably get back into the reviewing.

So for the last time for a little while, here’s Christian Siriano:

Siriano’s designs are a great example of work I feel guilty enjoying. I know that when it comes to quality, the high fashion community have a lot of (negative) things to say and I really can’t speak to that because quite honestly, I know very little about textile manufacturing. Solely from my own point of view though, I do like his work a lot. I wouldn’t claim for a minute that he’s a pioneer in terms of his creations but I would 100% love to wear them and I DO hugely admire his commitment to putting women of all sizes on the runway and designing pieces that don’t simply cater to straight up and down types which is more than can be said for most brands. I get that his collections are pretty formulaic, taking what has worked for the likes of Chanel and Alessandra Rich, De La Renta and Carolina Herrera, Michael Kors too (who is kind of guilty of the same thing himself), but that’s not to say his work is bad. Let’s be real, we’ve been on this planet thousands of years, we’re all taking inspiration from someone, and maybe figures like Kors and Siriano could wait a *little* longer before taking said inspiration but their aim at the end of the day is to sell clothes, not break barriers, a task which although often left to the big name brands, they too often fail at. I’m not going to lie, I’m feeling this whimsical mid-century tea party vibe, it’s elegant and it’s cutesy and My Fair Lady-esque, and you bet your arse I would be absolutely thrilled to wear one of these looks on a summer red carpet. I just can’t say no to anything tulle-maybe it’s that I was on Toddlers & Tiaras in a past life or maybe it’s that I watched too many Barbie Princess films growing up, but I like pretty much everything going on here, especially Siriano is giving us matching fedoras too. Plus, can we take a moment to praise Siriano for his COVID relief efforts? Near the beginning of the pandemic, he turned his studio into a mask manufacturing factory in order to send them out as donations, and I think that is very cool.

Then there’s Christopher Kane who once again came through with the most insanely gorgeous prints:

I mean, paint splattering is hardly a new technique but I haven’t seen it done as a print so tastefully before-it eats the Moschino biro scribble print (which apparently was copied too speaking of the tendencies of designers to “borrow” inspiration) for breakfast. It’s shit because there weren’t many looks in this collection and they weren’t really shot in a way that does them any justice but I thought I’d include the few I saved.

Comme Des Garcons is a fave of the high fashion community and one I look forward to seeing at fashion week but can never quite get behind. I appreciate the what-the-fuckery of it all with this show totally being able to pass as a run-through of some kind of nuclear waste themed scare house at one of Thorpe Park’s fright nights. I assume given that and the plastic Mickey Mouse print it’s supposed to be some kind of reference to the part late-stage capitalism has played in the hellish landscape we find ourselves in today? Or something all intellectual? In which case I made my interpretation with farrrr too much confidence. But Anyway! Who knows! I’ll leave the analysis to the fashion students, and give it one word: trippy.

Onto Dion Lee, a brand I truly do get excited to talk about because it’s rare that I don’t LOVE his work.

Without fail, Lee manages to be confidently ahead of the curve without going out of his way to announce it and his genius to everyone with flamboyant shows and exaggerated designs and extortionate prices. He is very much an underdog in the fashion world in terms of big names but you’ll be hard pressed to find anyone who doesn’t love his collections. His S/S21 collection is one of my favourites of the bunch. I love seeing something I’ve never seen before and the palm leaf breast plate is so odd but so cool and so perfectly Dion Lee at the same time; we’ve seen jungle/tropical inspired collections sooo many times *cough cough D&G cough cough* and THIS is how you make them fresh and unique. I mean, never in a million years did I think I’d get behind the resurgence of the gladiator sandal trend but Lee has me changing my mind. This is one of the very rare times you will ever see me using this meme to praise a man but:

I mean, he has Fernanda Ly modelling for him, that the man has taste goes without saying.

Now for a bit of a full circle moment, given that I did actually praise Dior’s haute couture collection in my first ever post; Maria Grazia did GOOD. Well, with haute couture at least.

She’s always pretty hamfisted with her references, there’s no denying, with that Grecian Goddess style RTW collection typifying that statement completely, but luckily she struck gold this time round; as someone who studied the Tudors for A-level history, seeing a modern take on the exaggeratedly feminine renaissance silhouettes with the baroque prints and the deep jewell tones got me super excited especially when you throw in the dreamy tarot theming and the nods to the mystical and arcane. Seeing as the Heavenly Bodies Met Gala (I know, I know, I need to move on) was some time ago now and Cersei Lannister’s *SPOILER* been crushed by a rock (could also be seen as a metaphor for the irrelevancy David Benioff and D.B Wise condemned GoT to when they aired that shitty ending tehe) and so probably won’t be getting a collection based on her costumes any time soon, this is the only fashion take on this kind of period dress I’m going to get…and you know what? I’m okay with that. Thanks Maria, I guess?

Her RTW collection wasn’t absolutely awful either, and slightly better than the past few collections at least. Put a monkey in a room with a typewriter (or show it enough similar well-received collections) and it will eventually write something that makes sense, don’t they say? I like the nomadic feel of a lot of the looks and there’s beautiful layering going on but the aura of exotic opulence unsurprisingly didn’t stick around for long and I found that there was a decline in quality in the midsection of the show that landed a lot of the outfits in either awkward mother of the bride at a beach wedding or The Only Way is Essex Ocean Beach PLT sponsored poolside party territory. The looks picked back up a bit towards the end stretch of the show but I wasn’t a fan of the Gucci style oversized glasses which were so out of place with the rest of the theming that if anything they seemed like a cheap grab at relevancy. So yeah, a middling, subpar Etro-esque collection which is better than usual for Dior I suppose.

Next, Elie Saab, whose S/S21 collection was kinda disappointing, tbh. Oh how the turns have tabled given that positive Dior review and my usual love of Saab’s collections.

I know his dresses lose some of their appeal when we can’t see them in motion but even ON the runway I can’t see myself being dazzled by any of these pieces the way I usually am. They’re lacking the level of detail and craftsmanship I associate with the brand seemingly in favour of block colours and suits and the issue is that the whole Disney Princess fantasy has always been the appeal for me because the silhouettes aren’t interesting enough on their own. They’re not ugly pieces, they’re nice, but does nice really have a place in high fashion when the pieces are so basic in both their design and presentation that the shots could pass as ripped from a catalogue? The strongest parts of the collection were when it did go down the more delicate route with the muted blue suits and the white feather trimmed dresses, the small, ornamental gold details reminding me of a very toned down nod to Schiaparelli’s hardware, but with regards to the bright coloured pieces, I can’t lie-they did look like something you could find in the M&S Per Una holiday section. Then you’ve got the weakest parts, which were just flat out ugly: sheer giraffe print, sweat band style elasticated waits, and long chiffon shirts that I hate to admit read as frumpy. There are times where I’ve not been particularly excited by an Elie Saab collection in the past, but I do think this is the first time I’ve actively disliked parts of it.

Conversely, Erdem’s S/S21 collection was super strong, and solidified the brand’s place in my mind as a dependable source of kooky maximalism, this time round giving us Anya Taylor Joy’s Emma wardrobe on speed. You could tell me Erdem Moralıoğlu had just raided the Bridgerton set’s fitting rooms and put it on a runway and I would 100% believe you and I mean that in a positive way because to give my unpopular opinion, the clothes were the only good thing about that show. The endearingly florid details of exaggerated bows and clashing florals were still there but this time in a way that felt more subtle and self-assured, as if the calming influence of the wooded set’d had a direct hand in the designs, giving the rugged, ethereal feel to the collection I associate with brands like Brock and Simone Rocha, all whilst keeping the parts of Erdem I’m so fond of.

Is it really much of a shock that I included pretty much every look from the Etro S/S21 show? Like, you know that Christian idea of God, like, (the voice in my head is very much taking on the dumb valley girl voice that anybody who reads this is most probably getting too) knowing our souls? I think Veronica Etro knows mine. So no, no surprise. Though there were a few unconventional touches thrown into these looks (the campier prints and nautical theming we see with the 80s beach towel print, for example, reminded me a bit of Versace) the mystical bohemian it girl that Etro designs for would still be highly satisfied. Sure, it might be a wardrobe fit for a holiday less adventurous than backpacking but if she wanted a tropical poolside holiday, this collection is the one, the paisley print chiffon mini and maxi dresses especially. I’m just gonna pretend I don’t see the monstrosity that is leggings worn as trousers-it’s a fashion rule I refuse to abandon-because they are the only stain on an otherwise expectedly gorgeous collection.

Next, an unusually reserved RTW collection from Fendi:

More in line with the wardrobe of a European fashion editor than the glamorous trophy wife (who let’s say uses that facade as a guise to ruthlessly run her husband’s whole business empire from behind the scenes because in this house we do complex female characters only), these pieces are lot “smarter” and more professional looking than Fendi’s typical offerings; where I feel Fendi usually designs for the society girl who wouldn’t mind a front page scandal, these are the kind of outfits a young member of Monaco’s royal family would wear for a positively received but business-as-usual press tour. I know, Fendi is an Italian brand, but this is more Southern France to me. We’re talking some 2nd page shots of a Kate Middleton type on a yacht on the Riviera smiling and waving as her PR team’s ideal scenario. Still, whilst fewer exaggerated silhouettes, animal prints and overtly luxurious fabrics (real leathers, silks and furs for example) mean that the drama’s a little toned down, it’s all still very expensive looking and combines the classically feminine glamour of the past and the minimalism of modernity in the artful manner that we’re used to. Maybe it’s me being a basic bitch but I always love seeing Ashley Graham on the runway too, even if brands to tend to use her as their single token plus size model.

Kim Jones’ debut haute couture collection for Fendi, however, wasn’t a very well received one. I don’t hate it personally but I can see where the criticisms are coming from. Whilst it’s closer to the version of Fendi I’ve come to expect and there were some stunning pieces which completely encapsulated that distinctive aura of luxe and glamour, there were quite a few lazy pieces which could’ve been from any designer. I also felt the collection was a bit upstaged by what seemed to be a who’s who of the modelling world; having Bella, Cara, Kate and Naomi ALL walk in one show was a bit distracting and took the focus off the clothes completely.

Giambattista Valli’s RTW collection was gorgeous as ever; the man has undeniably mastered the art of delivering classic, objective elegance, the kind of designs I feel would make you light on your feet and smell like strawberries and cream the minute you put one on. Whilst as a brand his RTW shows are rarely trendsetting, they reliably produce a plethora of unfailingly graceful and demure pieces, as appealing to your mum and your grandma as they are to young women and little girls, and this collection is another victory lap for Valli when it comes to upholding his signature tea party and artisan cupcake making and rose garden strolling and bottomless rosé brunch appropriate aesthetic. There were a lot of outfits that were bordering on overly juvenile, with structures a little too basic to justify the amount of sequins thrown on, but when it’s good, it’s so sweet that regardless of how to formula it is, I can’t help but fall in love.

Valli’s haute couture collection was stunning too and for sure a more exciting offering than the RTW. There was of course a lot of the signature tulle but it was head-turning, over the top in a way that leant far more towards the experimental than I expected. The photos themselves are 100% believable as a some kind of Vogue behind the scenes editorial shoot on the set of live action Disney princess movie (in between takes of the climactic ball scene if you wanna get specific with the vision); if you are looking for a prettier alternative to the primary colours and disruptive shapes of a Molly Goddard collection, this is the one. It’s giving the themes of excess and abundance I associate with that of the Hunger Games Capitol but through the softer lens of a Sofia Coppola movie, and being the typical cinema loving white girl I am, I’m obviously on board with that vibe.

I did SUCH a 180 on Givency’s S/S21 collection from when I first saw it to writing a review. My initial reaction was one of disappointment, I guess simply because Givenchy has given us so many bold pieces and presentations over the last few years whereas this is more low-key. After properly considering it though as I would any other brand, I came to the conclusion that I do actually really like it. It’s still got the strange, androgynous silhouettes popping up throughout and the futuristic space-age details but with a more down-to-earth, streetwear feel, albeit a very slick, glossy spin on the trends of the rabble (that’s us guys) of course before we go believing it’s achievable. On the one hand, the devil horn accents are a touch Claire’s accessories halloween range but at the same time, done with confidence they’re kind of cool and bring something new and fun to the table in line with the dark theatre of Givenchy’s last few shows.

Now for Gucci, which for the first time I have to say, if I'm attempting objectivity, is not a standout.

Like, can I just start by saying though the format it’s presented in is cute, it’s not ideal as a way of actually showing the collection. I get that the vintage shop bin vibe is a huge part of Gucci’s brand but polaroids make it SO hard to actually see the clothes, and that’s what we’re here for right? I don’t want to give the impression that I don’t like what I see here-the clothes are gorgeous, an idyllic ode to the off-duty wardrobes of Studio 54-ers, bohemian style icons like Charlotte Rampling and young Olivia Newton-John, psychedelic rock guitarists and the inhabitants of San Fransisco’s Haight during the late 60s and early 70s, Alessandro Michele’s favourite period of reference. I can’t pretend otherwise, or act like I wouldn’t want to wear the shit out of this collection. Buut, for Gucci? It’s a little underwhelming. These are the kind of filler looks we get in a typical Gucci show to go alongside the more statement pieces, which this collection is lacking. It’s just that these are designs which usually gets people talking and these pieces don’t do that. It sucks because for most other brands this would be a stand out collection, an immersive, luscious vignette of what people tend to think of as a cultural golden era, but when you’ve had a show that involved models carrying replicas of their own decapitated heads down the runway in the last 5 years, of course something more toned down like this is gonna generate a lot of “is that it?”s.

I owe Hermes an apology. Looking back, I have disliked all their previous collections for the same reason that I now really like this one; maybe it’s in part down to the frustration of still having to whack out the winter coat on occasion in May (fuck British weather and climate change), but suddenly I really appreciate the value of some good quality, versatile outerwear. Hermes is giving us that in spades here and for that, I bow down to them. The pieces on offer are clearly well-made and genuinely practical, and through the minimalist approach manage to retain both an air of timeless sophistication whilst also being youthful and on trend. The leather tactical vest co-ord I can easily see edged up and taking centre stage on one of those insane Seoul street style slow-mo TikToks that were big a couple of months ago and there are several pieces that could tie together a grunge influenced k-style look just as well as they could exist for years on end as the wardrobe staple of a high-powered businesswoman. Designer Nadège Vanhee-Cybulski’s strengths really come through with the simpler looks and it’s the patterned pieces that drag down an otherwise flawless collection; I guess because the aesthetic is very minimalist, the patterns can’t be anything overly decorative but unfortunately this has a bit of a dowdy effect when you pair it with such modest silhouettes. Disregarding those elements of the collection though, it was super good.

It goes without saying that Iris Van Herpen’s haute couture collection was breathtaking; if the fashion community can agree on anything, it’s that this woman’s work is consistently awe-inspiring. She captures the wonder of the universe, the biological structures and kaleidoscopic colours we don’t even register, through fashion in a way that others can only imitate, to mesmerising, truly transcendent effect; I can only assume Van Herpen has mother nature whispering into her ear because how the hell else do you explain her ability to take the kind of microscopic organisms they show you images of in an outdated GCSE science powerpoint and make a dress that resembles one so stunning? Care to explain, Iris? Because if there is some kind of line of communication between the two of you can you please tell the bitch I’m over this weather and that I have cute summer outfits I’m waiting to wear so can she pack this torrential rain shit in? K, thanks xoxo

See it seems shady as fuck to go from IVH to Isabel Marant like this because we are talking 2 designers with totallyyyy different approaches to fashion; Iris Van Herpen is haute couture for starters whereas Marant is commercial, and that’s her thing, but unfair comparisons aside this collection is still a bit of a let down. This is considering I do usually really like Isabel Marant collections based on whether or not I’d wear the pieces, which seems a more appropriate barometer to use to come to a quality verdict. Whilst there were a few of the elegant bohemian pieces my mind goes to when it comes to her brand, the steps outside of that comfort zone didn’t pay off; graffiti print (can be cool if done with some subtlety which apart from a few exceptions was not the case here), cheap looking reflective fabric, and MC Hammer style dungarees, it seems to be an attempt to merge 80s trends with modern urban culture, and an attempt that at times verged on the disastrous. It’s good for a brand to experiment, of course, and appeal to a wider client base than usual, but when it’s bad the unfortunate take away is that the design team don’t have the chops to pull off straying from familiar territory; designers wouldn’t be showing at fashion week if this was truly the case because disregarding the influence of nepotism, fashion is an area you need real talent, perseverance and business smarts to excel in, and so it doesn’t do a team justice when they do fail.

J.W Anderson, on the other hand, really put his best foot forward this season and presented this work in a really cool way too which only added to the positives; whilst the way the shots were edited was funky af, it didn’t detract from the actual outfits, and if we are to see the same limitations when it comes to the F/W collections being released, this is something a lot of designers and editing teams should take note of. The idiosyncratic exaggerated shapes that we see as a recurring feature of Anderon’s collections were still on show but this time round with added femininity, billowing skirts and trailing jewellery that channel the stage looks of Stevie Nicks in a way that’s modern and functional and maybe even fit for the office if you were to work in a more creative industry with a chill boss. Could also work for a coven of witches who practice meditation by bonfires in the moonlight and burn the letters of men who wronged them in some Arizonian desert, so like I said, functional! Who doesn’t like versatility? The only thing I’m not too keen on is the shoes but they’re not so bad that it affects my opinion of the collection and they look comfy I guess.

Lastly, we’ve got to talk about Jacquemus, one of the most influential names in fashion at the moment. And yes, this time round, I’m doing it: I’m buying into the hype.

This collection is gorgeousss! I can see already that a lot of the recurring elements of the show are going to be big summer trends for this year (the cut outs and strappy details on the blouses are everywhere already) even though it isn’t hot enough to have collectively decided the time to start dressing for heat is upon us yet, and that’s always a good indicator of how successful the designer was in their vision and attempts to assess the needs and wants of fashion enthusiasts; whether I’m as big a fan of his work as everyone else seems to be, there’s no denying Simon Porte Jacquemus has always excelled at this practice if the buzz around him is anything to go by. It makes sense given the last year of us all being stuck in and suppressed that a lot of us are already romanticising the summer ahead, anticipating picnics and beach days and general Theresa May running through wheat fields type shenanigans galore, in spite of how dubious an assumption it is to make that British weather will allow for this; Porte Jacquemus has very much catered to this wishful thinking and the popularity of the whole escapist “cottage core” aesthetic, sexing it up a little bit with pieces that hug the body in ways only Mugler knows how whilst being lightweight and relaxed enough to look good with windswept, sandy hair and a little dose of sunburn. I’m talking enough to give you some cutesy freckles and rosy cheeks not PSA on the importance of suncream territory, guys, what is it with those of us on the gen Z/millennial cusp not taking sun damage seriously!? Why do I have to beg so many of my friends to wear it!? Does nobody else remember those photos they’d show you in PSHE in English primary schools of burnt people’s skin under UV lights? Or is that just me being weird and only having such a vivid memory of the images because teachers told us we had to wait until year 6 to see them due they to their “graphic” nature only for my gore-loving self to be extremely underwhelmed when we finally did get that lesson? They showed us a woman giving birth in year 4 for fuck’s sake. THAT was traumatising.

Back to the actual point anyway, with just a couple of negatives, the first of which being that the pieces are very similar to those feminine looks we saw dotted about the Jacquemus menswear collection from last year that were all over fashion Twitter. In Simon Porte Jacquemus’ defence though, it makes sense that those tones and silhouettes would be revisited in a full womenswear collection for that very reason; considering they went down so well and that lockdown gave us a bit of a half-baked summer in 2020, expanding on those elements enough for a whole new collection makes good business sense. We did get some cool additions too, mainly in the form of accessories, with the hardware details on the belts similar to those included in the Givenchy collection and the abstract hair slides being standouts for me. It was all exquisite-the shoes, the jewellery, the styling, everything 10/10. My other nitpick, and I say nitpick not because it’s not important but because it’s an issue that’s hardly restricted to Jacquemus (this casting team are far from the worst offenders, Saint Laurent I’m looking at you), is that I WISH we’d see more diversity with the models. Despite what my body dysmorphia yells at me, I am small, and yet seeing all those fucking minuscule waists made me die a little inside; it’s crazy to me that in 2020 the lack of variety in body types on the runway is still such a problem.

I must have said this a million times but I don’t want to end on a negative note so let me reiterate: this collection was STUN. NING. Plus there were some others I’ve talked about in this post that I’m sure will make it into my top 20 in the final part, Jacquemus, Dion Lee and Etro for sure; we even got some gorgeous pieces from Maria Grazia which I thought was a sentence I’d never type out. Have I said enough to not leave a bad taste in the mouth of anyone who read to the end of this post? I hope so, lol! TBH, it’s impressive given everything that’s going on that the majority of designers did roll out collections in September as usual so serious respect to them and their design teams for that.

In the next post, I’ll fingers crossed be able to include everything from Kim Shui (exciting!) through to at least Off-White (actually pretty good this time?!) and make this whole thing a 4 parter before getting straight on top of the photo posts I’m thinking about doing for the time being for the F/W21 shows. So as usual, if you did read to the end thank you so much and I respect the perseverance you must have to get through all my rambling, lmao. Hope everyone is well and coping okay and again, my inbox is always open for any post suggestions, constructive criticism, or just a chat for anyone who needs a listening ear.

Big love and thank you again!

Lauren x

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everything-laito · 4 years

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(idk if this needs a TW: abuse, violence, memory loss. )

This might sound dunb but if i took a baseball bat and hit Laito as hard as i possibly can would it trigger something to make him act different? Or make him forget about himself/Yui and he’d bo longer be abusive?

It’s not a dumb question, because I do not believe there are such questions, so don’t worry about it! Although this did make me laugh because it so vividly reminded me of the “horny bonk” meme salfkdjgaslf it just fits Laito to a T lol

Never thought I’d pull on my STEM jeans completely up on this blog, but here we are, and I’m incredibly excited!

klSFJklagsdf note that neither of my majors involve neurobiology/neuroscience but I do know a good chunk, let’s jump right in! Also, I’m assuming that Vampire brains are similar to human brains in this manner as well lol

and as always, rant under the cut!

First of all, I’d say that being hit with a baseball bat to the head is a type of blunt force head trauma. This type of trauma can cause a concussion or a contusion. Concussion, as commonly known, is caused by shaking of the brain, while a contusion is a direct injury to the brain. A more severe case is a contrecoup, which is injury that occurs at the brain opposite of impact.

Here’s my source!

Apparently personality changes are common after a traumatic brain injury, and can even effect the brain long after it’s healed (neuroplasticity babyyyy). This is what this article says. Your personality doesn't change, it’s more of the moods are so overwhelming it feels like you’re a different person:

Many people suffer from social anxiety, irritability, anger, depression, feelings of overwhelm, general anxiety, mood swings, or emotional lability (teariness) after their injury. But make no mistake: While these symptoms can make it seem like you’re a different person now, your personality is intact. It’s just buried under the weight of symptoms that are so, so hard to handle.

Think of personality as a collection of traits, and your mood as your current state of being. Normally, our moods don’t last for weeks and months on end. But after a head injury, negative moods like sadness, anxiety, or irritation can drag on, making patients and their families mistake the emotional symptoms for personality changes.

Lmao, flashbacks to the whole American football controversy???? ooooooop! But no, it would not affect Laito’s personality in the case you are thinking about. It really would make that shit worse. I could go on about nature vs nurture and what personality really is, but ima just say this here:

The reason why Laito is abusive + has a facade is because it is his way of coping with emotional, psychological, and even physical trauma earlier in his life. He projects his situations and feelings onto others so he feels “better about himself” and to get “revenge” in a sense.

So it’s not as simple as you think it might be. However, let’s take this a step further. If we were to change someone on a chemical and neurological level like this and do it the old fashioned way; aka not emotionally or mentally confronting these issues that could be solved but change the brain physically.

I’m talking about lobotomy/leukotomy.

If you don’t know, this is a type of neurosurgery that severs connections to the brain’s prefrontal cortex; aka the anterior frontal loves of the brain. This was common in Western medicine for about two years to “help” mental disorders. However a lot went wrong, and some people got more aggressive, patients developed seizures, emotional blunting, or just unable to mentally function. There’s a lot of unexpected and mixed consequences about it, basically it’s just: don’t mess with the brain.

If we’re talking about memory loss in general, or amnesia, can be caused by brain damage or disease. The hippocampus is commonly associated with memory (and memory loss) as well as the medial temporal lobe. A protein, RbAp48, is also associated with memory loss when it is deficient. Without me going off on genes n such (that actually happens to be related to my concentration for one of my majors) its basically like not having this protein = you’re unable to carry out the certain pathways and such in order to remember something. Deficiency in this protein usually means you have a damaged memory.

Amnesia causes can usually be categorized into head trauma, traumatic events, or physical deficiencies (like hippocampus atrophy; which means that part just isn’t used). The type of amnesia associated with head trauma is usually anterograde amnesia (also its an effect of long term alcoholism so stay safe kids). It’s also associated with post-traumatic amnesia as well. Or just remove part of the hippocampus since we’re delving into the darker era of neurosurgery. But acute blunt force trauma to the head in the hippocampus region could make Laito lose his memory, but it definitely could result in other consequences that are unexpected or just “undesirable”

TLDR: dont mess with the brain lol it’s the most important organ for a reason, your neurons can't repair themselves, shit’s permanent!

DSLFKJ Strawberry, you probably did not expect this answer to be well, this. But welcome to everything-laito, where I will talk your ear off B)

Hopefully you enjoyed though, despite it being balls to the wall LMAO! See ya later! -Corn

#analysis #god this was so fun to write lmao I get too excited about proteins so I had to stop myself #laito sakamaki #sakamaki laito #raito sakamaki #sakamaki raito #diabolik lovers #dialovers #dialover #dl

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nightcael · 4 years

Text

MAG22.5 Interlude

{I wrote all this for the Magnus Fluff competition, but when I rechecked the rules I realized I couldn’t use Sasha, so I never submitted this, but enjoy anyway Happy Valentine’s Day!}

18 March, 2016

[light switch sound]

SASHA Oh… oh wow… this is… this is the saddest thing I’ve ever seen.

TIM Hm? Oh, there’s some concentrated bachelor sights and smells. [dramatic] It’s like a diorama of the solitary man! Observe, the phone charger, uncomfortably far away from the bed! The laundry, bundled up in a Tesco bag! Apparently Marto uses Irish Spring, smells better than files but not much!

SASHA You can even see how he actually tried to spruce it up, bless his heart.

ARCHIVIST Sasha, Tim, why are you loitering down here, you’re supposed to be-

SASHA Jon, have you seen the literal tragedy that is this room? It couldn’t be worse if it was staged.

ARCHIVIST I organized that room.

TIM Well there’s your problem.

ARCHIVIST What’s wrong with it?

SASHA It’s just… it’s so sad, thinking of Martin trying to sleep in this horrible little room with- [sounds of Sasha moving some boxes] well, all these file boxes crowding around him. Probably looks like something peering over him in the night.

TIM Maybe it’s reassuring? Like, (singsong) sleeeeep deeear Marrrtinnnn, good night sleep tight, don’t let the worm worms bite~

ARCHIVIST That’s insensitive, Tim.

TIM HA! This coming from you?

SASHA Tim, help me move this filing cabinet, let’s get him some more room by this cot.[sounds of a filing cabinet scraping on the floor, scene continues with occasional scraping sounds of boxes and things]

ARCHIVIST Really, both of you, I know for a fact that there’s actual research to be done.

SASHA I’m gonna be real with you Jon, I’m not doing work until this room is habitable. Would you sleep in here, I mean, really?

ARCHIVIST I regularly sleep in here.

SASHA Ugh! I should have known better than to ask you.

ARCHIVIST Where is Martin anyway?

SASHA We got him looking up the stuff you gave us.

ARCHIVIST You unloaded all your work on him to come spy on his room?

TIM Well, when you say it like that we sound like bad friends. [A sound of surprise, like pfflflglhlflf] NOPE. WOW. NOPE.

SASHA What is it? Yeeee-nope, that’s horrifying, kill it with fire.

TIM [somewhat recovered] Hey, boss, you still out there? This one of your clown paintings, with the eyes cut out in a not creepy-beyond-all-reason way?

ARCHIVIST [actually startled] Ah! Good lord. Where was that?

TIM Tucked between all this cardboard beside the bed so you know Marto was having good dreams with Eyeless Bobo ten centimetres from his head. Yeesh, there’s a bunch of pictures here with the eyes cut out.

ARCHIVIST Fine. Alright. Take the time to spruce the place up. Martin’s… Martin’s been through enough without that thing in his room.

SASHA I’m going to get some things from the shop. Martin probably likes yellow, right? I think I’ll get a spider plant too-

ARCHIVIST Spider plant? No, don’t encourage him.

SASHA [laughs] Spider plants are not what you’re imagining. Well. Maybe a bit, I don’t know how wild your imagination is. Maybe a candle too, for that lovely combination of old paper and… pants.

TIM Cute pattern on the pants though.

ARCHIVIST Leave his things alone, Tim.

—tape clicks off

—tape clicks on

SASHA Ahh, it’s actually looking halfway decent now. ...Tim?

TIM Yeees?

SASHA I don’t mean to critique your… artistic vision, but… spider memes?

TIM Martin likes these. His phone camera roll was full of these little fuzzy weirdos. And the odd selfie, which also fits that category, to be honest.

ARCHIVIST Time’s up, I assume you lost track of time.

SASHA Nooo, I’m not finished! Distract Martin before he comes back! I want it to be perfect!

ARCHIVIST Distract him? How?

TIM Nobody can distract Martin like you, boss. Just go… stand in the way and glare.

ARCHIVIST [scoffs] Fine.

[footsteps]

MARTIN Oh! Oh, h-hi, Jon! How are you? I compiled as much as I could on the… ehh… why are you staring at me like that? Do I have something on my face?

ARCHIVIST [Stern] Martin.

MARTIN Wh-what? You would tell me, right? I don’t want to be walking around with jam on my cheek all day, I’m still trying to be professional even though I slipped up the other night, er, morning, that is.

ARCHIVIST [softer] H-how are you? Dealing with… things?

MARTIN [audibly blushing, pleased] Uh. Uh? I’m fine? It’s a little stuffy down here, not much air flow and uhh… why is the light on in my room?

ARCHIVIST Um uh um ehh…

MARTIN [Brushing past] Hey, what’s going on-

[sound of a confetti popper, Martin squawks]

SASHA AND TIM [disjointed and unpracticed] Happy- um- New/Improved Room… Room Birthday?

MARTIN Oh! Oh, gosh, you guys… it’s heh, it’s… thank you, that’s really- that’s really kind of you.

TIM We gotta stick together down here! All for one and for for all, right, boss?

ARCHIVIST [after a beat, it occurs to him there was four Musketeers] ...yes. Take care of each other.

/end

#tma #the Magnus archives #magnuspod #magnuspod spoilers #jonmartin #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #Tim stoker #sasha james #I cant believe I didn’t read the thing close enough until I rechecked #either way #enjoy haha

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faelune-home · 3 years

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Jumbo ask meme: 🌹, 😊, 📀, 🛍️, 🔮, and 💗 (sending you the same questions bc I think they're good ones!)

Apologies for taking a few days to get back on this, I needed to collect my thoughts to write it, which took some time on its own XD But thank you for the ask \o/~~ Always appreciated ^^

🌹 - miqo!Fu is very much the social butterfly type. Maybe initially with larger groups she’s a bit wary - joining the scions, she was more subdued since she’d just been thrown into it, plus the feeling that everyone else already knew each other and she was the newbie, but she eventually grew out of it, and especially after the Waking Sands attack, she vowed to hold a bit faster to her friendships with those that did survive - but otherwise, she’s always the first to try and make new friends, or at least be open for others to talk to her.

Making enemies tho...well she never deliberately sets out to do that, and unless the other person is set on being hostile, she would try to bridge a gap. Although after all that she’s been through, that tendency is a bit slower, maybe she’ll allow the diplomatic folk to make the first step before her, but actively trying to make enemies isn’t her thing.

😊 - Aaah, at the risk of sounding cheesy and obvious lol, its her friends. ^^ but i suppose in the event they’re not available, ironically it would be the opposite - some time alone in Gridania. She’s still very fond of the old forest since it was the first place she really knew in Eorzea.

And making others smile is her goal, she set out on the adventury thing to help others (and make a legacy to share with her loved ones that they could emulate...so in a way still continuing the idea of helping others for the sake of helping others). If it makes things easier for those that struggle, then she’ll try her best \o/

📀 - miqo!Fu is a bit less easy to manipulate after so long, tho she does have help from the other Scions to make sure she’s not being given the slip. She tries to be careful nowadays after so many events have occurred, but she still wants to be open and friendly to all. But for the most part she does trust very easily, and she likes to hope others will trust her. Hopefully without any insane hero worship, despite her goal of leaving a legacy, too much hero worship makes her uncomfortable cos she feels it makes people forget who she is as an individual vs what deeds she’s done as the WoL. Maybe from strangers she’s fine with it, but from those that she’d consider friends...ideally no.

The lies and manipulation though....aaaaa. That’s a tricky one, because obviously those closest to her that she trusts have done that for all their own reasons, and it depends on the individual how she feels about it. This feels like an appropriate point to discuss that, even if things get a bit wordy. >.>

(I’m gonna read more here, partly due to talking spoilers and partly due to length. Ironically the next few questions after this are very short in comparison but this one about “lies and secrets and trust” got very wordy on its own lol)

HW and ShB spoilers after the cut

With the Lyse reveal, it did sting to start with given how close miqo!Fu was the “Yda” and Papalymo, but after some thinking on it - like Lyse’s situation, understanding that it was a maybe not so healthy coping mechanism after losing her sister that then just spiralled further, plus the immediate aftermath of Papa’s death affecting all of them, putting Lyse’s situation into some perspective for the WoL - miqo!Fu got over it a lot quicker than even she expected. In the end of that case, Lyse is still a friend, and one that she trusts a lot, especially after seeing that, for all Lyse was trying to emulate her sister, she really was more like the same person Fufu already knew.

Urianger’s frequent cases are a mixed bag for miqo!Fu >.> Because on the one hand, she knows he’s not doing it maliciously, but at the same time, its still secret keeping rather than trusting her, or even the other scions, so intent on working on his own. Plus the fact that often, his plans are eerily pragmatic and someone is on the chopping block along with it - Minfilia was cast off to the First in the conflict against the Warriors of Darkness, and now she’s gone for good, and G’raha obviously offered himself up as a sacrifice with the WoL in the frontlines first, so Urianger technically had less say in that, but that one didn’t pan out anyway - and she doesn’t agree with that, she’d rather try to avoid as many deaths or sacrifices as she can. She trusts him maybe a bit less now, however she’d still trust him to watch out for her if need be, its just when it comes to making plans, she’d rather if he worked with others rather than doing things on his own.

The catboy himself is kind of an example as well >.> miqo!Fu still doesn’t see the point in him hiding his identity other than so she wouldn’t then want to make sure he didn’t do that. But the identity hiding part aside, he falls into the hero worship side of things that makes her uncomfortable. She still trusts him as a friend and companion of course, but the idea that she’s somehow untouchable and all powerful just because of some old texts that survived past the 8th calamity doesn’t sit well with her. Again, that may be the end goal with her becoming an adventurer, but she does want to hope she can fade off and let the stories do their thing where she doesn’t have to then experience the fawning, and having it up front with a companion doesn’t help.

(Have i went too far down a rabbit hole here? is this off topic from the original question? idk :’D i hope its still okay, it’s nice to think a bit deeper about my girl and her motivations and thoughts on things)

🛍️ - This one :’D I feel this one differs from player to character, a lot of the glams i post here on tumblr and socials in general are more me as a player having fun with fashion over me actually representing what miqo!Fu herself would do. There’s some overlap though.

As a player, as Lady Fufu, I go for aesthetic, whatever looks nice, or whatever my vision for an outfit is. Miqo!Fu on the other hand, while she does have a fashionable streak, she tends more towards function and comfort.

So more flat shoes than heals for battle, the heals are better served for fancy occasions where she doesn’t have to fight. Skirts or trousers depends though on what job she’s running as.

One common point is skirts for dancer ^^ I like my flowy skirts flying around as she spins and flips.

🔮 - Star gazing! She loves the wide open night sky! Definite night owl, much like me the player XD But then she has an important job to do so she’ll stomach the mornings if need be.

Oh and she’s definitely a snuggler ^-^ In her home village, she’d often go to bed with at least a few younger miqittens cuddled up into a pile with her.

💗 - Miqo!Fu would probably say her eyes, big and bright and purple :D

Other might say her tail, its very expressive, you can read her easily by it XD

#seaguanaisland #faelune asks #character building #long post #fufu faelune #my wol #keeper of the moon miqo'te #thank you for the ask~

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kintsugi-sheep · 3 years

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2021.01.10: Redcaps and Manga Reviewing, Vigor and Nostalgia

Alright, so what happened this week?

Well, I don’t think I’ll ever forget what happened this week. I was six when September 11th occurred, so I wasn’t really cognizant of what had happened. But I am cognizant now. And I won’t forget what happened on January 6th for a very long time. I don’t consider myself especially patriotic or loyal to the democratic system of government as it operates in this country, but I do acknowledge when something so sacrosanct is violated.

I don’t want to spend time getting into this. If you’re old enough to find this blog post you’re old enough to know what happen. I hadn’t intended for that to be what I wanted to talk about anyway.

Where I left off last week, I wanted to announce my intention of making a video on Shaman King.

There are a number of hurdles—some might even dare to call them issues—with this idea. I’m not a reviewer. I don’t have any video editing experience. I don’t have a platform of great enough scale to protect my work. And, for the nature of what I intend to write, I may not even have enough time to get it out before the series drops in April.

So why bother?

Because I love the series. For years, it almost never came up in conversation, but when it did, I was pumped up with the nostalgia I had while reading it. I didn’t know where this excitement came from for years.

It’s a good manga. Not the best that there ever was, but yet I inexplicably loved it. And I didn’t really know why. But when I was asked what my favorite manga of all time was my answer would be Shaman King.

When I heard the anime was getting a re-release and when I heard they were going to re-publish the manga in full this time, I was ecstatic. I told my friend about it and, being the type of person who’s typically late regarding news related to anime releases, they already knew.

Then, I saw the articles. And my heart ached.

Read my article about how Shaman King is pulling a Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood.

Read my article about ten characters that will be in this anime that weren’t in the original.

Read about whether or not this character is okay for woke 2021.

And I my stomach sinks when I think about what will be coming next.

Theories made by people who read the series and are reciting spoilers for clicks.

Essays on why Hao is the greatest anime villain of all time for clicks.

Speculation on whether or not Yoh can beat Goku in a fight.

I don’t have a very high opinion of journalism. And knowing that the series I love will be used and disposed of for quick clicks is upsetting to me.

In deciding to do this project, I put it all together. I realized why I loved this series.

When I drew as a youngster, Shaman King’s stab-your-eye-out-on-my-protagonist’s-edges art was my early influence for character design.

Every story I’ve come up with—whether or not it’s been continued, recycled into another idea, or wholly abandoned—has had themes of spirituality that I’d only seen present in Shaman King as a child watching it on the FoxBox.

It was my exposure to the reality that manga and anime don’t always coincide; I hadn’t watched FMA or FMAB yet.

I used to record the Saturday morning cartoons and watch them with my grandmother, and while for years I’d hop between Fox, the WB, and ABC recording cartoons so that we’d watch things like Lilo and Stitch, Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends, the Proud Family, Xiaolin Showdown, Coconut Fred, Ultimate Muscle, Johnny Test, Mucha Lucha, Jackie Chan Adventures, even One Piece—to name what I could from the top of my head, these shows didn’t all run on these channels in the same breadth of time—I’d skip over Shaman King, keeping it selfishly to myself like a child would.

This week, it hurt watching a bunch of redneck monsters trample over the Capitol. As someone cynical of the government, it hurt to know something so sacrosanct could be treated so shamefully. But it hurts so much worse to imagine that I wasted all these years, like a boy concealing his affection for a girl until she falls into the arms of someone else, to actually take the time and express the love I have for this series.

The image of this post is an issue of Jump a buddy of mine bought at a thrift store or yard sale and gave me almost three years ago. I posted the picture with a long blurb about how my week feeling on Facebook. A lot of it is auxiliary, but I’d like to recount what I wrote here.

Spoiler alert, I was feeling a little pretentious that day:

“Vigor. Even writing this feels more cumbersome than it actually is.

How do I say what I mean? I hate nostalgia. It’s true, if hyperbolic. I see it cut down so many peers, creatives, and critics like a guillotine; a sloppy, artificially guided, swift force that lops their heads into a collective basket of thought.

Still, this past week I’ve felt my own dismissive chest opened with a more surgical precision that permissed” [NOT A WORD] “nostalgia to play with my heart strings. I reflected on Avatar, a show from a time when animated shows didn’t have their runtimes bisected for the simpler consumption of children that would choke on anything longer, that powered itself on the labor and inspired vision of its creators and crew as opposed to memes for the children and references for the adults, and had the temerity to demand that an audience be comfortable going thirty minutes at a time without a joke to amuse them.

My friend went to Pennsylvania and got me an issue of the now defunct Shonen Jump magazine from 2004. It had series of comics I’d forgotten about and an ad for Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 2, but those were inconsequential. I find Shaman King to be the greatest comic I’ve ever read and in August, the month of the issue I’d received, the protagonist was featured prominently on the cover. I remembered how engrossing it was to read something with that level of complexity; taking into account my age. And never since have I seen a series with such a great balance of brutality and humor and never since have I seen any form of media where” [REDACTED FOR SPOILERS] “led to a happy ending.

To round it off, within the hours before writing this I’d watched Feel Good Inc. I couldn’t help but feel my eyes begin to water at the genius of Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. An unforgettable song latticed with moments of haunting beauty and brilliance.

As a child I would sit down for hours to draw terribly. And I loved every warped, misshapen, humanoid, tailed thing I drew. I’d scan my grandmother’s cookbooks and write recipes by mending foods I liked together in a manner similar to Frankenstein assembling his monster. I wrote chapter after chapter of a terrible story because I wanted to prove to my first girlfriend that I could write something better than twilight. I had a sense of self-motivation. I hadn’t struggled through college for a year to graduate without confidence in my own abilities. Or lost friends to unfair circumstances beyond my control or the ignorance of how much control I had. Or been stressed to the point of genuine fear from some of my earlier work. In many ways I still feel like the child I was when I lived at my grandmother’s house. Except now as a child too anxious to do anything besides what he knows will keep him alive.

How do I say what I mean? Not well. That, too, may have been a bit too hyperbolic. It’s not that I hate nostalgia, but that I fear being stagnated in memories of better days. Still, like a failing vegetarian having a hamburger the time I’ve taken to indulge myself has let me realize something I’ve been missing from my diet.

Vigor.”

#writer #author #writerblr #blog #shaman king #vigor

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elcorhamletlive · 5 years

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Fandom: MCU (post-Avengers) Ship: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark Tags: Fluff, Pining Tony Stark, Steve Rogers and the 21st Century summary: As Steve discovers the internet, he also discovers old memes.

As Tony and Bruce climb out of the lab, the sound that echoes in the room is so foreign that it takes Tony a moment to realize it’s a laugh, and one more moment to realize it’s Steve’s.

At the top of the staircase, Tony sees him on the couch, and yeah, he’s laughing. Not politely chuckling or awkwardly forcing a laugh, mind you, but actually, genuinely having a belly laugh, complete with a pink flush all over his face, his eyes turning into tiny blue streaks as he wipes them with back of his hand, catching his breath.

It’s—well. It’s a vision, to be blunt.

“Sounds like you’re having fun,” Bruce says, and that’s the understatement of the year, because Steve looks downright delighted. He struggles to catch his breath, still grinning helplessly as he looks away from his phone.

“Oh,” he says, as if he’s just realized their presence. His flush deepens, Tony notices. Steve’s has kind of an ugly flush, that shows up in red spots coming up from his neck as well, instead of sticking prettily to his cheeks. Tony sticks his hands in his pockets to control his itch to touch it. “Hi.”

“Hey, Cap.” Clint throws himself on the couch next to him and leans, trying to take a pick at his phone. It’s rude, but Tony can’t really blame him, because he’s one step away from offering actual money to find out what made Steve laugh like that. “What are you looking at?”

Steve controls his grin into a more schooled smile, but he still perks up , and in a moment Tony is right behind the couch, leaning forward to place his hands over the cushion. From behind Steve’s broad, sculpted-by-the-Gods back, he catches a glimpse of a Twitter feed.

“I was trying to learn how to use, hmm—Twitter, right?” He pronounces it correctly, which really shouldn’t make Tony want to kiss him in congratulations, but it absolutely does. “And I found this, this page…” His face twists in an effort not to laugh. “You’re not gonna believe it. Here, I’ll show you. You guys need to see this.” He holds up the phone a little higher for Tony and Bruce to see.

As he types – a little slower than most people would – a name into the search bar, Tony’s heart kind of breaks.

“It’s genius,” Steve says, as the account opens. “I was just looking at this one—”

“Wait,” Clint interrupts. “Are you serious?”

“What do you mean?” Steve asks, with a little frown between his eyebrows that Tony’s hand itches to smooth it out. “I know it seems silly, but it’s really funny.” He turns, and, at Clint’s gaze, grows more indignant. “The pictures are very good and the captions are really creative.”

“I know,” Clint says bluntly. “It’s Dog Rates, Cap. They have over eight million followers. It’s a huge account. Everyone knows it.”

Steve’s frown vanishes, but it’s replaced by something a lot worse: surprise, and then a clear, raw disappointment that he does his best to mask. His posture deflates, his hand going to the back of his neck, rubbing it.

“Oh,” he says, and he’s back to his usual man-out-of-time voice, probably feeling old and stupid, the excitement from before already a distant memory.

It’s legitimately like someone turned off the sun. So, really, nobody can blame Tony for saying, “I didn’t know it.”

Steve looks at him. “Really?”

“Really?” Clint asks, a thousand times more skeptical, and Tony gestures flippantly at him.

“Not all of us have free time to troll on Twitter, Barton,” he says. Then he turns to Steve, who’s watching him with wide blue eyes that almost make him forget how to form words. “So? What’s all the fuss about?”

“Oh, yeah,” Steve says, a hesitant smile already blooming on his face. He turns further to show his phone exclusively to Tony, signaling for him to lean further so their heads are closer, which isn’t a configuration Tony minds, at all. “See, it’s very simple – they post a picture, and give it a rate. At first, I thought it seemed a little harsh, because, really, which dog should ever get a low rate, right? But, see—all their rates start out at ten.”

He proceeds to show some of his favorite posts. Tony’s seen them all, either from following the account or from random dog memes Rhodey sends him sometimes, but he plays along, ooooh- ing and awwwww -ing at the right moments, and in no time Steve is grinning again, glad to be explaining something to someone else for a change, feeling in the loop.

Some people could say what Tony’s doing is lying, but he disagrees, because he isn’t faking it at all when he grins back.

After Steve finds out Dog Rates, it doesn’t take him long to find Thoughts of Dog, which he finds even more delightful. He shows it to Tony during breakfast, sitting next to him on the counter as they go through the tweets together.

“This is amazing,” Steve says. He’s at that stage where it seems like his cheeks hurt from smiling. Tony thinks he should look like this more often. Maybe all the time. “When they explained it at SHIELD, I thought the internet was more of a tool, like a huge encyclopedia. And obviously, it is, but it didn’t occur to me it could be…”

“Fun?” Tony asks.

Steve looks at him and smiles. Tony is quite fond of that sequence of events.

“Yeah,” he says. When he smiles like that, a dimple shows up in his cheek.

Tony isn’t even a dog person, but it couldn’t matter less.

Steve eventually expands his knowledge of animal memes and pages to include cats, which means Tony starts receiving lots of videos that were, at one point, considered the pinnacle of internet humor, with cats playing piano and sliding over wood floors.

Steve finds out about Grumpy Cat a few hours before he learns she’s dead. In between, he texts Tony a bunch of pictures of her with a message reading “this is how you look at morning team meetings”.

Tony honest-to-God giggles, because, really, he’s a lost cause.

A few moments afterwards, he receives a lengthy message of Steve saying he just found the cat in the picture had died, but she had apparently lived a long and happy life and so he hoped Tony wouldn’t be sad by finding this out.

Since Tony doesn’t immediately answer (because there’s a marching band leading what is apparently an eternal fourth of July parade in his chest), Steve then apologizes for sending the memes in the first place, and, look—if nobody sees Tony sighing, nobody can prove anything, regardless of what the dopey smile on his face might suggest.

On a remarkable occasion, Steve sends in a “important Avenger news – waiting for your thoughts, Iron Man” e-mail, and, when Tony opens it, he’s rick-rolled in front of his entire office.

“This is the cringiest shit I’ve ever seen,” Clint, who’s there to get suit upgrades, says.

“Shut up,” Tony says.

“SHIELD has informed him we think it’s best if he doesn’t have a Twitter account,” Natasha, who’s there to have lunch with Pepper, says, and even through her supreme spy training Tony can tell she has to try hard to keep an even expression. “For his… reputation.”

“Oh, shut up,” Tony repeats. “It would only make him more popular, and you know it.”

Natasha shrugs with a knowing smile. “To some people, maybe.”

Tony looks away, his face heating.

Eventually, Steve confronts him about it.

They’re on the couch, right after what wasn’t exactly a date, but also wasn’t definitely not a date either—Steve had said he was hungry, and Tony had asked if he wanted to get dinner, but then Steve said “sure, there’s pasta in the fridge”, and they had ended up eating in the living room, plates full of large portions of heated up pasta from lunch (which, against all odds, tasted really good).

Now they’re on the same couch, bodies lax and full of carbs, and sitting pretty close to each other already, although Tony does take advantage of any opportunity to slip a little closer. They’re watching as Steve scrolls through a series of images on his phone, all historical pictures or paintings with a photoshopped, photobombing squirrel.

Tony chuckles, because he barely remembers this one, and because Steve seems happy and relaxed and this makes it easier for him to laugh.

“How come you don’t know any of these things?” Steve asks with a raised eyebrow. “You work with tech.”

“Machines don’t make memes,” Tony says. Then, after a second, he adds: “At least not good ones.”

“Your profile is one of the most followed of all time on Twitter and Instagram,” Steve counters.

“Wow, okay—cyber-stalking much?” Tony replies, which makes Steve’s cheeks grow a little pink, but he doesn’t seem too embarrassed, just a little shy as he opens a small smile. Tony takes the opportunity to nest a little closer.

“I was just looking,” Steve says, his eyes landing on the point of contact between his and Tony’s shoulders. They’re so close now they’re basically leaning against each other, and Tony is about to retreat and mumble an excuse to leave and save himself the embarrassment, when Steve adds: “It’s nice. That—that you don’t mind me sharing things.” Then, to Tony’s bafflement, he comes closer and leans his head on Tony’s shoulder. “There’s so much to catch up on. Sometimes it’s nice to—to feel like I’m in the loop for a change.”

There’s a knot in Tony’s throat, and yet his body is reeling, completely taken by the warmth of Steve’s frame cuddled up against him.

There must be something in Steve’s eyes, too – something more than what his words say, something brighter and warmer that’s almost blinding as he stares at Tony, something that makes Tony confident enough to lean forward and press a kiss on the top of Steve’s head.

“No problem,” he muffles against Steve’s hair.

Steve hums pleasantly and then asks Tony if he’s seen the world’s fastest skateboarding bulldog yet.

Of course, Tony hasn’t.

#stony #stevetony #superhusbands #stony fic #happy steve bingo #reblogs are love

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bixgirl1 · 5 years

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Author Meme

Thanks for the tag, @magpiefngrl !!

Author Name: Bixgirl1. Bix for short.

Fandoms You Write For: HP, and primarily drarry, though I do have a Good Omens fic on the shelf.

Where You Post: AO3

Most Popular One-Shot: You and Me, 8th year D/s navigation — though at 28k, Idk if it should be counted as a one-shot just because it only has one chapter? lol.

Most Popular Multi-Chapter Story: In Evidence of Magical Theory. (44k) 8th year Bonding, which explains its popularity, but I did have a lot of fun playing with the magical theory in it. :D

Favourite Story You Wrote: Hmmm. I’m not sure; I’ve got over sixty HP fics up now, and the ones I really like are my favorites for such different reasons!! lol. So okay I’m gonna go ahead and post three (keeping in mind that it’s never a set thing): Love Him More , which gave me the opportunity to not only examine love in several different ways, but to delve into how much of a choice loving someone can be; Every Me and Every You because I got to play with so many tropes (Harry gets cursed to leap into alternate versions of his own life), and because for several of them, I got to play in some of the gorgeous worlds @magpiefngrl has created; and probably my tropes fic, That Old Black Magic , because I had this vision of Harry and Draco for it and they so closely resembles that, and because the balance of its construction pleases me to no end.

Story You Were Nervous to Post: Every single one ever. I am a ball of nerves all the time when I post. And then for like a month after. It is not pretty.

How Do You Choose Your Titles: Honestly, sometimes it feels like my titles choose themselves? I won’t even list any of them, just looking at my collection of work will probably tell you which ones came to me in a burst of blinding light (or, alternatively, existed before the fic did), and which ones I’ve struggled with before just slapping a title on. lol. I mean, I guess that’s not entirely fair, sometimes I do spend some time fiddling with a title and then come up with something I love after workshopping it a bi, but for the most part. I tend to be really drawn to titles that a) have multiple meanings, and b) have a certain rhythm to them.

Do You Outline: A little, for longer things (once I know it’s going to be long — which sometimes doesn’t happen until I’m a good 5-10k in. lol). I’ll do a skeleton outline, I guess: I make notes of points I want to hit, sometimes dialogue that occurs to me, and keep it in a doc with any of the research I have to do for the fic. For shorter things I just sit down with an idea and let shit fly. :D

Complete: 61!

In-Progress: Three that I’m currently working on. Or rather, three that I’m not — I’ve been experiencing the worst sort of executive dysfunction for the last few weeks, and keep wavering between which to work on next. *sobs* And a few others in various degrees of progress that I want to write but am in no rush to get to.

Coming Soon/Not Yet Started: IT DEPENDS ON WHICH ONE OF THE THREE WINS!! *sobs for several more minutes*

Do You Accept Prompts: Sorta? Idk. People are free to send them to me, but my inbox, like, hides asks, and I also sorta suck when I feel like I’m disappointing someone if I don’t write one of their prompts? So I’ll occasionally get in the mood to do something random, ask for prompts, and do maybe two or three before crumpling and hibernating away from the word “prompt” for several months. (Sorry!!!)

Upcoming Story You Are Most Excited to Write: The one I started late last year, In the Dark, which is kinda (heh) dark, and long, and only about half finished (I think). But it’s also the one I’m most intimidated about picking up again, because I haven’t engaged in that world for the last several months. So executive dysfunction Strikes Again! lolol

I think most everyone has already been tagged in this, so tag yourself if you’d like to do it! <3

#author meme #writing life #fic life

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mimzy-writing-online · 5 years

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Describing Eyes (without Color)

I saw myself in the mirror tonight. I saw my eyes in the mirror tonight and everything else about them. holy shit. i don’t look good. i’m well used to the red-purple coloring under my eyes and it’s usually limited to around the inner corner of my eye but oh my god it GOT WORSE it’s red/purple/and BLUE now. my under eye circles?? (is this the right word for them??) are turning blue and stretching out to the outer corner of my eyes. (I googled it, originally I said eyebags but that’s not what this) but yeah I have not been sleeping well for my entire life and lately I’ve been up until 3 in the morning AND IT SHOWS

I started this post a week ago and then lost momentum and saved it to draft, but the scary sight of my eye circles has me revisiting this. So here it is, describing eyes without color.

Things that make eyes special:

We will all fall into the habit of over describing the color of a character’s eyes, we will all mention rare gemstones and oceans and skies and chocolate and warm and etc.

To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with mentioning the color of your character’s eyes, but there are a bunch of other cool details you can add into describing eyes that tell more than just color.

Read More about Describing Eyes without Color Below

Details about health, age, and wellbeing

the thin creases at the corners, hints of wrinkles yet to come, years yet to live, but signs of a life well lived and far from over

The purple and red shadows wrapping around tired eyes, this poor person has been working so hard and trying their absolute best and the thing they need most in this world is a full night’s rest

when the skin of their eyelids is so thin and pale you can’t help but see the spiderweb network of purple veins. They look almost frail with eyes like that

the foggy color in the eyes of the elderly, cataracts that build up with time and age

half-open eyelids, eyes that slowly blink and nearly close before snapping open, god they look so tired

dilated pupils from drug use

mismatching pupils after a concussion or head trauma

the whites of the eyes may be read from recently smoking weed

the whites of their eyes are yellow from jaundice or other liver failures

the skin around their eyes is puffy/baggy (other poor health issues)

eyes are shaking/dancing from a condition called nystagmus, which is a condition common with people with vision loss/eye conditions. I don’t have it but Molly Burke does. Here’s a link to a video she made about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBB8nIz9FW0

Here’s a basic article of nystagmus to add to it: https://www.allaboutvision.com/conditions/nystagmus.htm

side note I like allaboutvision’s website for a lot of simplified explanation of vision conditions and they were a huge help to me in research about my illness. Look for multiple sources always in your research

Details about emotion in the eyes

eyelashes matted together and damp with tears

irritated, red tear ducts from too much crying and rubbing

smudged makeup from crying

sloppy makeup because they were in a hurry to get out the door (were they late to work and panicking? Were they late to a date and too excited/nervous to check their makeup?)

the wideness and bright eagerness or surprise, waiting for something big, especially in children

eyes squint shut when people laugh or smile widely sometimes. I have a character with a specific smile like this that most other characters don’t have.

Some people can have a sort of dead/empty look in their eyes, something vacant. Lights off, nobody home. Reasons for this might be: drug/alcohol use, disassociation due to mental illness (early/mid/post anxiety attack? flashback? depression? distress?) or due to grief. It could be due to emotional or medical shock. (those two are very different and you should definitely know what medical shock is if you write about anything traumatic happening to your characters, especially when third parties like cops and medical personnel get involved)

People’s eyes could be “dead looking” because they’re at a point of mental exhaustion, such as a dead-end job sucking the life and energy out of them or because they’ve been up too late studying for a test they feel hopeless for

Details about the character themselves

the color of their eye makeup can say so much about a person’s style. Imagine someone in a hospital gown but with dark eyeshadow and dark purple lipstick, that bit of personal style that can’t be erased by the anonymity of a hospital gown

their eyes are obscured from a scratched, smudged pair of glasses that are several years old now. Are the glasses really that old or are they a bit careless with their glasses and accumulate scratches quickly?

their makeup and glasses compliment each other, they wanted to look nice and put in effort

Actions used with the eyes

Characters roll their eyes when they’re amused or finding a joke not funny or are annoyed with another character. Eye rolling can be very expressive

Eyes drift and fix to one spot when someone is daydreaming, rarely moving from that space (in my experience. My and my dad both have been asked about staring by my mom for this)

Some characters are horrible with eye contact and this can involve many reasons. It is common in autistic people, but it’s also pretty common for autistic people to make too much eye contact to compensate/seem normal. (they shouldn’t have to compensate/seem normal/make themselves uncomfortable for social convention, but whatever)

Or someone might have anxiety and in social situations eye contact is bad

They grew up being abused by an adult or authority figure and eye contact could have resulted in angering their abuser, or refusing to give eye contact could have angered their abuser. Think this over with any of your abused characters and decide where they fall in that.

I (sometimes) struggle to make eye contact with people I’m dating or have a crush on, that’s just personal experience but not all of my life experiences can be that unique, really, not that special

Characters who are nervous and/or in dangerous situations will flicker their eyes between different people in the situation, with a higher focus on possible threats

someone might be good at hiding when they jump from surprise or suppress a flinch, but their eye twitches because evolution and the human body can’t stand the idea of their eyes being hurt... (well aren’t you just a defiant shit giving evolution the middle finger, I think to myself, blind and doing ~just fine, thank you~ with your vision impairment/disability... sorry, I just love pointing out the irony)

eyes can stay pinned to someone specific because they’re worried about that person, whether it’s because that other person is obviously injured or ill or mentally/emotionally distressed.

They might stare/watch that person because they are the true threat in the group.

It might be because that person is enigmatic and your character can’t quite figure them out. It might be because your character is in love with that other person or has a strong crush on them and wants to see and observe every moment of that person’s life

eyes can be calmly shut during meditation

eyes will twitch behind closed lids during REM sleep (research this too) but your characters won’t likely notice unless they’re looking closely

or what if that person is pretending to be asleep but their eyes aren’t moving like that and someone notices

words words words words words...

Some simple one word explanations for eyes so you can be quick/brief in your descriptions (you don’t need to be super descriptive of everyone’s eyes, just when it matters to your character or plot)

Eyes are-

kind, calm, tired, sleepy, weary, sad, haunting, agonized, lonely, happy, energetic, lively, empty, wrinkled, squinting, suspicious, flickering, flighty, angry, furious, fiery, regretful, tearful, crying, wandering, loving, worried, distant, vacant

I feel I should go back to my “How Observant Are Your Characters” post, because knowing how observant your characters are or what their critical thinking skill to interpret the things they see will help you decide what your characters should notice about a person’s eyes and what they should not notice.

How Observant are Your Characters? https://mimzy-writing-online.tumblr.com/post/185322857894/how-observant-are-your-characters

(It’s occurring to me that it’s getting late ~ha, I’m living up to my blog header of late night writing advice~ and that I should be sleeping if I want any improvement on my over-all sleep deprivation issues (I don’t care about the eye circles as much as the needing sleep to not die or lose my sanity bit) so I’ll end it here

Follow this blog for writing advice, relatable writing posts and memes, as well as updates to A Witch’s Memory, my wip.

#writing advice #writing tips #writing #writing community #writeblr #oh look it's well past midnight again #mine #my post

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mysticalmindblog · 4 years

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A candid look at one of the most common sources of heartbreak and sadness readily available to each and every human being. The Internet is awash with memes and quotes mixing Positive Affirmation with Expectation. The reality is that when you are prone to expecting something, you are opening doors inviting disappointment and suffering to visit.

THEME: Until you can accept what is, you will never move into what could be.

Look back on your life, and count the many times you feel you have been let down, deflated, disenfranchised, because expectations and promised results didn't come to fruition. How much suffering have you gone through in your life because you mentally and emotionally invested far too much in expectations that proved unrealistic..??

There is a glut of memes and quotes all over Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and many other online sources that are very generic and 'feel good' but with no substance.

Examples are:

You Deserve It, So Expect It

Expect and You Will Receive

You're a Winner, Expect Great Things

It's Good to Know What to Expect

You Are Unique So Expect Unique Things

etc. etc. etc.

Some of these quotes have tens of thousands of likes. The problem is that they are so general and generic that the presupposition is applying to ego, rather than the truth. It is part of the 'INSTANT' gratification "Feel-Good" motivational movement that is nothing more than a mental band-aid rather than an enlightening revelation.

There's also a fine line between expectations & dependency. There is another fine line between expectations & an entitlement mentality. Inevitably, to be in expectation of something opens up the doors of possibility to disappointment & suffering. It is far preferable to work with Mindful intention instead, in the present moment you are in, to project desired results.

Expectations

Having expectations being thwarted leads to very deep sadness and longings... They can just rip out all of your cultivation and capacity for being able to give kindness and compassion to others and can make your soul stale.

They can make a warm heart turn ice cold.

They can cause mental anguish and intense frustration.

Expectations, for the most part, are made up of the imagined desired results for a future moment in time. They represent a large percentage of thoughts that are dedicated to the variables of the future. Expectations represent a diversion from present mindfulness, away from the moment you are in into the unknown moments of the future.

Truthfully, we all suffer from vulnerabilities intertwined with emotional dependency on expectations projected, like architectural blueprints, on those around us. Disappointment after disappointment wears down our patience, as well as our ability to trust and give unconditionally.

On the extreme far end of the mental spectrum, many people who walk around in a constant state of anxiousness due to 'Expectation', also exhibit egocentric and entitled behavioral patterns.

It's a trap.

Over-indulgent and pampered personalities tend to lead lives where they expect, and expect, and expect (the best, the more, the most), and often with emphasis on being entertained and distracted by nonsense more-so than anyone else around them, or the VIP treatment; is another way to put it.

Disassociate

It is for me an ongoing quest, to disassociate from emotionally attaching to high hopes and expectations in regards to the attitude, words, and actions of others.

From family, to friends, to acquaintances and strangers, in a variety of settings, they will invariably surprise you in a negative way at some point or other; it is inevitable. Often this is because we invest far too much expectation upon them. In some ways, our expectations can become so unrealistic, that they depend on the person in question making personality changes that are not even made clear.

I talk often of the Noisy Mind condition; where we go from moment to moment not actually living in the moment, but living either in the past, or the future, or even worse: Both simultaneously - all without actually living mindfully in the present moment.

The inherent problem with setting expectations in regards to all those you have come to know is that we always seem to set the bar too high. It helps me to look inside myself at my own failings, and the ways I could improve myself - before looking to others for inspiration. Additionally, as I mentioned earlier, setting expectations makes us deviate away from present-moment mindfulness.

Here are some plain truths:

We have NO control over anyone but OURSELVES.

We have NO ability to see the FUTURE.

We have NO ability to change the PAST.

We live in NO other moment but the moment we are IN.

We have NO better immunity against emotional pain than ACCEPTANCE.

We have NO better immunity against anger than COMPASSION.

The ONLY one who can truly know you is YOU.

The ONLY one who can use the key that unlocks your heart is YOU.

The ONLY one who can make you change who you are is YOU.

So basically this article comes down to some harsh and unpleasant facts; such as dealing with the negative aspects of people that WILL invariably either go out of their way to hurt you, or alternatively hurt you in their ignorance. As such, you measure the depth of your sufferings and pain based on your expectations.

Expectation is a strong form of attachment making. It is that which will sink deep hooks into your most sensitive nerves, and will ever-so-often bring tremendous suffering.

Now it is important to point out here that I am not saying that as far as I am concerned, it is best to go around looking at everyone through cringing and skeptical eyes, treating them all as potential antagonists - definitely not. Alternatively, what I am saying is what I actually try to practice daily, treat others as you wish to be treated, but don't attach to the expectation that they will reciprocate. It is as simple a recipe as that.

The Alternative

The 2nd Noble Truth of Buddhism teaches that 'Suffering' is due to attachments and expectations, to grasping and clinging. This truth is a secular truth whatever your belief system.

So how do we liberate ourselves..??

You can literally transform your life by learning your own personal art of "Letting Go.."

It is a matter-of-fact that by cultivating and changing your mental thought processes, you can relieve emotional discomforts and pain, and chief among those changes are the way you accept & embrace change.

Realizing how we instinctively react when provoked by broken expectations and unexpected change, and then modifying the way we react can help us break out of the need to be micro-managing every little detail of an uncertain future, and individuals in our lives who we have no power to change or control, and instead, we can simply embrace with acceptance of the present moment we are in.

It's only possible in the present moment that we will find the courage to cross the threshold of the unknown and relax into the changes we cannot avoid.

The Attachment of a Sense of Predictability

It is a Human condition, we feel that much more secure when we are assured that we possess a sense of predictability, and in that effort we invariably develop a great capacity for denying a very basic & simple truth which is 'that nothing stays the same'.

Such a denial can invoke an inner arrogance, an egoic but illusionary 'reality' construct; and then along comes the unpredictability of life, and through loved ones, friends, or life changing situations, we are painfully shown that even if we do everything "right" and exercise every precaution, we can still face extreme disappointment and unexpected loss.

As such, all too frequently, rather than surrender to the inevitability of change, and embrace it, and work creatively with it, we Humans resort to the anxiety & fear-based behavior of forcing situations to occur the way we want them to, and to take charge and exert pressure on other people and situations to conform to our expectations. Again, this is a terrible trap.

Your inability to avoid disappointment, broken expectations, and deflated dreams as well as accepting change may make you wrathfully angry, sad, depressed, and frustrated. It can be hard to let go of the false belief that the only way to achieve happiness again is to regain what's been lost. Even when you know you can't reverse the situation, you may enter into a perpetual suffering, and constantly agonize over this unwanted reality, knowing no inner peace as a result.

When faced with disappointment and broken expectations, we can mistakenly cling on to what once was, actively avoiding the needed process of grief and acceptance, and end up in a constant state of non-growth and life paralysis; grasping for a future set of circumstances or a situation identical to the past holding you back from discovering what better roads lie ahead, just around the corner, simply just outside of your vision. The desire to backslide, or reconstruct the known comforts of the past will almost always result in you walking around in circles, lost in the ashes of the unchangeable past, instead of venturing forth with mindfulness and actively taking steps to look around those corners and see new ways to grow, new paths to follow.

Change your Perspective

The change in perspective that invariably happens when we come to the enlightening conclusion that there's no such thing as a permanent comfort zone, or feeling of happiness, will allow us to embark on a voyage of healing from suffering. It leads to a rise in wisdom, a new understanding, and helps us take the next brave step which is to accept that we must often be broken to mould ourselves anew, and broaden our reality giving a new definition of what we need in order to be productive, happy, and liberated - giving up the old and painful habits of clinging and grasping, as well as the need to control external circumstances and future events.

It's important to balance the concept of something you want, with an acceptance of what is, right in the moment you are in. It is no good wanting something for what you want it to be, rather than wanting it for what it is now in the present. You MUST know your limits.

This subtle balance which is a mindset to adopt, allows you to live in this, the present moment and trust that your acceptance of a given situation or individual or concept, will relieve the suffering and confusion that comes when not things do not go the way you 'expect' them.

In other words, having expectations is an inevitable Human condition, but it is down to your Mindful clear thinking on how much you invest in those expectations, and how realistic they are, cognitively understanding that everything is impermanent, even expectations, that will clear the brain-fog of confusion, unnecessary emotional attachments, and distractions, and show you the path to move into a more clear and unrestricted, happier, way of life.

When we cling to the past or what no longer serves us, we contract ourselves to the point where we're unable to be nourished and invigorated by the present moment. We have to accept that what's past has truly passed in order to open up to what the present moment offers us. In this opening we become nourished, refreshed and revitalized.

Finally, it takes us making an effort, and acknowledging not only our own flaws and damaging personality traits, but also for the most part, understanding that the general population ultimately only care for themselves and their own comfort zones and closed circles, and will extract what they can for their own pleasures and comforts from whoever can supply it the soonest. That's the modern sociologically imprinted "I want it and deserve it and I want it now" illusionary construct. It is damaging to everyone, and leads to awful entitlement issues.

We can CHOOSE not to be that way. That's part of the old 'primitive' brain that is programmed with a genetic self-preservation instinct and gets combined with the ego to the point that so many end up with toxic personalities.

If we see it, recognize it, choose not to be a part of it, and instead take care of all that we have power over (ourselves), then we can be liberated from the suffering it can cause.

Knowing this, it is up to us as the responsible entities to go within and make the changes necessary to better deal with those occurrences, and live more in the present moment while annihilating our expectations of things we have absolutely no control over.

#attachment #liberation #new attitude #new life #moving forward #being strong #detaching #overcoming #be better #no fear #be strong #enlightenment #evolving #breaking free #selfish #selfishness #ego #egoic

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minhyunluvr · 4 years

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look | reconcile

"What was it that you wanted to speak to me about?" Your classmate pulled his chair out, placing his tray on the monotonous, planate table that stood between the two of you. His vision was focused on the cold soba in front of him, yet it sat untouched, even after he seated himself. The boy seemed different, drastically so. Your training together had ceased after his mother burned his face, and it was apparent that it had taken a toll on him. He had been a sweet boy in your year of knowing him, but now he came off as cold. Distant, even.

Clearing your throat along with your thoughts, you began to speak. "Can you recall training with a girl when you were younger?"

His eyes flicked up to your face in inspection. You attempted to keep your face as blank as possible around other people, but it was possible that he would be able to recognize you easier if you lifted the corners of you mouth. Begrudgingly, you carried out the action. Shouto's mother had always talked about how you were prettier with a smile on your face, and although you respected her, keeping a neutral face was more strategical. As you twisted your features into the unnatural form, his eyes widened. Instead of correcting his expression as a way of following what the two of you had been taught to do as children, the look of incredulity continued to stay glued to his face.

"Yunseo?" Letting out a breath of relief, your fake smile went away, only to be replaced with a smaller, authentic grin. To anyone other than the two of you, the small twitch of your lips would have gone unnoticed. He caught the movement, but the usual reciprocation was left undone. His eyes flashed with contemplation before returning to his normal, stoic facade. "How has training been going?"

Air blew through your nose in a silent sigh before you responded. "It's (Y/n), now. Training is similar to how it was with Enji, but consisting of a lot less... abuse. It's not direct, but Jinho has thrown me into rocks as if I were a rag doll on multiple occasions... It helps, though. I've become more resilient. You?"

The saddened look he shot your way was too much. Averting your eyes, you stared down at the food in front of you as he began speaking. "It's still the same. Stretches, gym training, hand-to-hand, then quirk training... You know the motions." Pausing, he flicked his eyes to the ceiling, hands fiddling under the table as he regained his composure. It wasn't that talking about life was the problem, it was that you had been his lifeline back at the beginning, and now you were back. You and his mother... "I've grown a lot, too. Sometimes I regret staying here, but once I graduate, I'll be free from him."

How tiring must it have been for him, a child, to scrape by all of the familial carnage that he had witnessed alone? It was clear that he had been raised differently to most people, his irregular maturity hinting toward it. It was a miracle that he hadn't ended up as a villain.

The two of you sat in silence for the next few minutes, reminiscing your childhoods. At the beginning, it was just you in an adoption home, waiting day after day for someone to take you. As the children around you grew older, the hope that they had once harbored was extinguished as the years passed.

'Why does no one want me?'

'Am I not good enough?'

Even though you had only been four years old at the time, watching people come and go had flicked a switch in you. A switch that shouldn't have been flicked for many years, a switch that some never turned on. The light that poured out of it was one of realization. The realization that humans are shallow, selfish creatures. The type that only care for themselves and what benefit them. Then again, isn't that the right way to live? Without any concern for another being, chasing after the prime version of you? Leaving the weak behind and taking in the strong as allies was the only way of succeeding in the abstract form of time that we call "life".

But then Jinho came in. In the world that had always been covered in a dark hue, he had shone a new light upon it. Jinho was a loving father figure for some time, Woojin being a supportive older brother. But once your quirk manifested, all of that changed. He sent you off to train with Endeavor, leaving little time for relaxation at home. Sometimes, you just stayed at his house over night. Woojin was a thing of the past, as he was busy training with his father, but he never changed when you saw him. He was still the same funny, overprotective and adorable brother you had always known. Jinho, however, became a distorted, fun-house mirror version of Endeavor. His morals became dubitable, fatherly affection scarce, and his old, empathetic nature was left behind. To this day, you were still curious as to why the drastic change occurred, and it would quite possibly stay that way, as it had for the past decade.

Before you knew it, the bell had rung, and you stood up to throw away the untouched food. Shouto followed behind, a dark look upon his face.

The next day, classes seemed to roll by slowly. Even more so than the first day, if that was possible. You had opted to sit by Kaminari that day, goal being to strengthen your relationships with your classmates. Iida had been sitting with Uraraka and Midoriya, the latter two not exactly being your type of people.

"So, (Y/n), how are things between you and Todoroki?" The red-head sitting across from you asked, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. "My name's Kirishima Eijirou, by the way."

You dryly chuckled, face devoid of amusement. As vague answers were best when you weren't entirely sure of an answer, you kept it simple. "We're friends."

"Oh. That wasn't juicy at all." Kirishima whined, slurping up his noodles. Jirou Kyouka winced from his left, scratching at her temple. You glimpsed a wire-like object sliding away from her earlobe. It seemed to plug into the side of his arm, resulting in a screech from Kirishima.

"You know, (Y/n), you don't have to deal with his shit." She said, retracting the extension. She lifted up the cup and took a sip, effectively turning into a meme. "He's a little bitch, if I have anything to say about it. Which I do."

While Kirishima rolled his eyes, Kaminari clung onto your forearm to keep himself from falling off of the chair in laughter. 'God, he's extra...'

As people filed back into the classroom, murmurs began to start up about the next class. Hero Basic Training, the class taught by the one and only All Might. You stayed in your seat in the back of the room, eavesdropping on other conversations.

"I'm gonna fucking crush that number one hero!" Bakugou.

"I wonder if his smile is as bright in person as it is on screen..." Ashido.

"Let me stick my balls to his muscles!!!" ...Mineta?

"...I have come through the door like a normal person!" A tall, masculine figure called as it hopped through the door. Gasps of excitement chorused throughout the room as the students came to the realization that it was, indeed, the All Might that the students had been itching with excitement to meet.

"Welcome to Hero Basics Training, the class that will give you all sorts of experiences to mold you into the great heroes you all aspire to be!" 'Only someone as comically acceptable as All Might could utter those words without sounding like a psychopath...' You thought. "No time for dilly-dallying! Put on your hero costumes and get out to Ground Beta for battle training!"

Sighing, you stood up with much less ambition than the other students. You just never saw the hype with All Might; he had a boring enhancement quirk. Nothing special, yet he had become the number one hero. Or maybe that was why everyone looked up to him? Because he was so... ordinary?

As you strutted into the facility, a few heads turned in your direction. Your quirk wasn't really anything that needed extra costume enhancements, so when you received the request form you thought, 'Why not wear something sexy and avant-garde just for shock value?' So there you were, with an arguably too-revealing bodysuit covered by a cloak and pointy sneakers. Shouto walked in behind you, making his way over to the wall. He gave you a look that said, 'Come stand by me so that you don't do anything dumb.' Reluctantly, you padded over to your old friend. He nodded down at the cloak in silent implication to show him your outfit. Rolling your (e/c) hues, you moved so that you stood in front of him before opening the cover-up.

Shouto took a glance at the slightly scandalous attire before waving his hands for you to cover yourself back up. With a condescending smirk rested upon your face, you leaned back against the wall beside him. While re-buttoning the cloak, you missed the bright shade of pink that tinted his cheeks.

Hua's Talk

here’s the costume

[m.list]

#bnha #boku no hero academia #mha #my hero academia #fanfiction #x reader #manga #anime #shouto todoroki x reader #shouto todoroki #katsuki bakugou #bakugou katsuki x reader #izuku midoriya x reader #izuku midoriya #look

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derangedsilence · 5 years

Text

Karlheinz

Permissions

Please feel free to check any of the Sakamaki Bros.’ permission lists. It’s pretty repetitively the same.

The only exceptions:

Shipping - Within any verse he’s participating in, it’s entirely possible for him to form romantic and/or sexual partnerships with anyone who suits his needs, fancy, etc. Canonically had three wives, you know what you’re signing up for if you aim for this. However, as Karlheinz is very good at controlling his partners to suit his needs, I would prefer that many of his romances not get commented on by the public unless they’re somewhere they could be witnessed or if the individual themselves talks about it. Feel free to ask me!

Participation - Hop into getting involved in plots and storylines! Just do the dashboard commentary thing and tag this blog so I can be sure to see it. This much is the same. However, for some people, plots will need to have certain secrets kept, etc. until later. You’re still welcome to get involved, but it might be better to discuss with me and any other involved players how to participate instead of commenting on the grapevine for those particular plot aspects.

Biography / Stats

FULL NAME. Karlheinz ALIAS. Tougo Sakamaki, Reinhart AGE. Appears 35-45 || Actually significantly older at 2000+ BIRTHDAY. Unknown GENDER & PRONOUNS. Male, he/him ORIENTATION. Heteroflexible. He’ll play it up for whoever can be used. SPECIES. Vampire. OCCUPATION. Vampire King (of the demon world), Japanese politician, school nurse... RESIDENCE. Someplace in the demon world, but visits the Sakamaki household from time to time.

HAIR. White, reddish/purple-ish EYES. Golden BUILD. “What the fuck, man, it’s like you’re photoshopped.” HEIGHT. 6'2'' ADDITIONAL NOTES. A known shapeshifter, not even his sons are sure they’ve seen his real form. He can easily appear as a man, a woman, etc. to suit his needs.

ZODIAC. I Hate You, Vampire Dad is a zodiac, right? ALIGNMENT. Unknown. POSITIVE TRAITS. intelligent, charming, goal-oriented NEGATIVE TRAITS. merciless, sees people as means to an end, lacks the ability to feel deep emotional attachment

BIRTH PLACE. Japan NATIONALITY. Japanese PARENTS. Unknown SIBLINGS. Sibling: Richter. Wives: Beatrix, Cordelia, Christa (also his cousin). Sons: Shuu, Reiji, Ayato, Kanato, Laito and Subaru Sakamaki EXTENDED FAMILY. Adopted Sons: Ruki, Kou, Azusa and Yuma Mukami. Bastards: Kino, apparently? EDUCATION. Unknown SPECIES. Vampire NOTABLE SKILLS. Being the worst dad ever, running extremely complicated and often successful experiments, is charming enough to be able to convince people who are fully aware of his nature that he really is sincere for them specifically, etc. LANGUAGES. All of them FAVORITE FOOD. The fruits of his labor

PUREBLOOD. Inhuman strength, increased speed, vision, hearing, and smell. Fast healing & healing saliva. TELEPORTATION. Can teleport instantaneously. FLYING. He can fly. SWORDSMANSHIP. S OTHER. In addition to the racial abilities of a pureborn vampire, he also possesses the highest level of magic in the Demon World and his power is considered by his race, as a whole, as well as his sons, as “Godlike”. Karlheinz is capable of unleashing his magic and destroying the entire Demon World. In addition, he can shapeshift and change his appearance as it suits him. Oh, did we mention he also has the ability to MANIPULATE TIME and REVERSE EVENTS until he’s satisfied? WEAKNESSES. None? DISLIKES. People not doing what he wants them to do in his experiments.

Appearance

*Will be updated as various ‘personae’ are implemented.

As ‘Karlheinz’, at least as most of his sons know him: A pale-haired, golden-eyed figure who dresses in extravagant capes. His hair falls past his knees in waves and he looks absolutely ethereal.

As ‘Reinhart’, the school nurse, he is pale with blond hair wrapped into a ponytail and wears glasses.

Personality

One of the most powerful creatures in the demon world, he is viewed by the vampires (the bat clan) as a God. Which may or may not affect his personality, but the fact is that it is universally understood that a man that’s over 2000 years old is in want of a new life goal. Or death.

INTELLIGENT AND MANIPULATIVE: Karlheinz rarely directly engages these days, usually pulling strings in the background. He manipulates for the better and for worse, only determined to get closer to his personal goals. If that heals some and hurts others, so be it.

AFFECTION: It’s well-known that demons do not experience the same emotions as humans, or at least, they do not act on nor feel them the way humans would. Even within the “emotions” and “bonds” of demons, Karlheinz is incapable of deep affectionate sentiments and believes that all demons are similarly incapable. He is obsessed with human emotions despite or because of his inability, glorifying them and incorporating them into his new demonkind 3.0 ideas. His inability to feel this deep affection doesn’t save him from confusion and hesitant behavior on the rare occasion his plans and experiments are not succeeding.

It’s worth noting that he is considerably kinder when engaging with humans, as he blatantly punishes his own kind for their very nature (of which he is entirely aware). However, humans break much more easily, so this may be a necessity for engaging those tools compared to his sons.

FAMILY: His sons, wives, etc. are all tools and test subjects with which to create a new race and “save” the Demon World. If they become failed experiments, he has no issue disposing of them himself. When it comes to his kids, he’s extremely neglectful but does not hesitate to order their punishment when they displease him. He’s imprisoned Laito, sent Shuu to the North Pole, and tossed Subaru into the ocean. Most of his abuse was directly on his wives and directly affected how they would raise their sons, however, for which most of the Sakamaki children loathe him.

PRINCE CHARMING: Karlheinz excels at charming and manipulating others. As with Cordelia, he promises everything to obtain them, spoils them, and then acts in whatever manner best executes his experiment.

History

Under construction.

Quick summary: Really good contender for ‘worst dad’ and ‘worst vampire dad’ awards.

Verses

Brief summaries of the verses for Karlheinz along with potential links for those less familiar with Diabolik Lovers but still want to interact with him. For the sake of keeping things clean, encouraging community-wide and cooperative storytelling in roleplay, and not letting things get too crazy, verses will be limited. More may be made over time as needed.

Summaries:

VERSE - HAUNTED DARK BRIDAL

Karlheinz is...somewhere. Doing things. Like usual.

*This verse will be typically be the default, 'main verse'. In this, it is assumed that Yui Komori is staying at the Sakamaki household with some version of the first game having taken place. If the second game is included, it's with the idea that Yui stayed with the Sakamakis.

Verse Details | Tag: #V; KARLHEINZ; HAUNTED DARK BRIDAL

VERSE - MORE BLOOD

Karlheinz is somewhere doing things, but now there’s Mukamis!

If for some reason it's absolutely necessary to differentiate between the verse above and a verse where More Blood has certainly occured, but Yui did not (at least initially) stay with the Sakamakis and instead is currently living with the Mukamis or was, until recently, still living with the Mukamis. Rivalry abounds and attempts to procure Yui are likely.

Verse Details | Tag: #V; KARLHEINZ; MORE BLOOD

VERSE - MISC.

Posts that could take place in the Sakamaki or Mukami verses but involve duplicates (whether Yui or others) in the same scene in a manner that would be hard to pass off as typical flow for those verses. Also includes nearly ANY time fellow characters are staying at the mansion, otherwise we’d end up with verses of 20+ additional characters hanging out in the Sakamaki villa.

Verse Details | Tag:#V; KARLHEINZ; MISC

SITUATIONAL VERSE TAGS

#V; KARLHEINZ; UNIVERSAL

Posts that can easily be assumed to have occured in either the Sakamaki or Mukami verses, typically answering asks, etc. that aren’t directly related to events unique to their timelines.

#V; KARLHEINZ; WHAT IFS & #V; KARLHEINZ; ONESHOTS

Likely reserved for one-off threads exploring a “what if”, a romantic meme that would otherwise be inappropriate, etc. If a meme doesn’t quite fit with one of the existing timelines, it’ll get one of these.

Trivia

Successfully cucked by Richter for years, but he kind of encouraged it to begin with so who really loses?

Can and will wear you out in the bedroom and leave you a flower to wake up to in the morning.

Gave Reiji a pocketwatch that shows how much time is left until the end of the world. Demon world? Human world? Who knows.

Really just wanted to know if Shuu would actually fight back against polar bears when he sent him to the north pole. Now he knows.

“Even when he loses, he wins” is a theme with this guy. I hate him, too. I know.