#it's past 1 am here)

[cable-salamdr]

They proceeded to recreate all of motm. Geo got to dress up as the munce queen and felt very smug about it.

(We are pretending it is still Halloween for me and not past midnight since an hour. Thank you.)

[moshaeu]

an older vaniper wip that i’m bringing out because i needed something to post for fom rambling purposes LMAOO

[fell-e]

"Please don't leave....."

[yinyuedijun]

新年快乐！！！ happy lunar new year my beloveds! I wish you all good health and prosperity in the year of the snake, regardless of whether or not you celebrate! I am cooking up some long life noodles and rice cakes for us all, pouring shots of baijiu, and also handing out red pockets to everyone here younger than me 🧧🧧🧧 let's have a wonderful year together!

[tiredguyswag]

it's really cool how almost all the "morally good" characters in cs have to be "pretty" and have anglocentric features and the villains and morally grey characters (specifically men) get to have non white features and by really cool i mean girl get up what the fuck

[wilting-fl0wer]

The only correct form of caltam, as far as i am concerned

[canon-gabriel-quotes]

✨💐 Mother's Day 💐✨

Transcript:

Machine. Gabriel omegaverse male pregnancy art.

Transcript:

I'm two days late... *gasp* Did Minos finally..?

Transcript:

Did Sisyphus finally..?

Transcript:

Don't come to my server.

Don't pray to me.

Don't "V1 pregnant" react me.

We're done.

*vine boom*

Transcript:

Guys, stop giving birth in vc.

Transcript:

You know.

I'd really like to say all of the pregnancy jokes catch me off guard.

But to tell you the truth, I was expecting.

i hate it here

Omegaverse clip

Minos clip

Sisyphus clip

Divorce clip

Literally 1984

He was expecting :]

[kylermalloy]

Sometimes I don’t think people understand the point of deterministic time travel stories.

(For the purposes of this post, a deterministic universe refers to a story in which there is only one timeline. Even if time travel exists, the characters cannot go back and change things, so to speak. In a deterministic universe, they would’ve always time-traveled, so the “changes” they attempted were already there, and nothing was altered. Think Interstellar, in which Cooper sends himself to NASA from the future.

By contrast, a branching timeline story would allow changes. Traveling through time assumes a new set of events and/or people who were not present the “first time around,” and so events can be altered, to the point of erasing established history. Think The Butterfly Effect, in which changing the smallest thing balloons out into an entire alternate reality.)

Whenever I hear people discuss a deterministic model of time travel, they seem to be under the impression that those characters are trapped by some nebulous fate or destiny, and that’s why things can’t change. The time-travel mode chosen by the author for the story has locked them into this particular set of events, they’ll posit, and no matter what the characters do, they are literally unable change it.

I couldn’t disagree more!

A deterministic timeline is a trap, to be sure—to us, the audience. The characters are free to make whatever choices they want.

I started thinking about this because of Attack on Titan, how Eren sees a glimpse of himself causing the rumbling from his father’s memories.

So many analyses will claim that’s why Eren started the rumbling later in the story—that from the moment he saw the future, he was somehow locked into that particular course of action. He was destined to kill millions whether he wanted to or not.

But…no. Eren didn’t cause the rumbling because he saw himself do it in the future. He’s not the audience looking in on his own story (not in that way, at least). He isn’t figuring out that there is only one timeline, or that he was fated to cause so much death. He doesn’t even know that he’s in a time loop where everything happens the same way every time!

No! Eren isn’t thinking about time travel physics—which are made-up anyway. Eren isn’t thinking Well I HAVE to do it, since I saw it in Dad’s memories. (Well, he probably does think that. As an excuse.)

Eren makes the choice to start the rumbling because that’s the choice he will always make regardless. That is who he is as a person. It’s a tragic flaw. It’s his character.

I’ve also been thinking about this because of Netflix’s Dark—a time-travel show I heartily recommend. It too has a single timeline, in which many characters meet older—and then younger—versions of themselves, and they pass along information bootstrap-paradox style.

The first time I watched the show, I had this passing thought—how did these characters remember exactly what their older selves said to them, so they could replicate the conversation when they were the older self?

It was a silly question, and the more I watched the show, the more I came to understand: The show is not about ~replicating~ or ~preserving~ events in the timeline. They’re not sacred, as some time-travel stories would have you believe. No, the single timeline never changes because the characters don’t change.

When Jonas, the protagonist of Dark, meets his older self, he can’t believe the shell of a man he’s become. He can’t believe himself capable of saying the things he’s saying, or doing the things he does. He’s not cataloguing the information passed to him so he can one day say it back to his younger self—that’s stupid.

I was caught in a fallacy of bootstrap paradox—how did they know what to say? Where’d those words come from? Well, where all words come from.

Older Jonas is speaking from his heart. He too had believed fervently that he would never become the person he is—but the day has arrived, and now he’s on the other side of the door. He’s saying the words while his younger self is frozen in disbelief. He’s not replicating a conversation he remembers—the words he says are the words he would say regardless. That’s what he’s always said, because that’s who he is.

This little quandary serves as a microcosm for explaining everything about deterministic time-travel. Both Eren and Jonas see themselves in the future doing horrible things. Becoming a version of themselves they would never dream of being.

As much as they tell themselves that’s not me, I would never do that, and even vow to find a way to prevent that future, they both fail in that endeavor. They both experience profound hopelessness and loss, and they eventually give in to their desires and their hopelessness and become the worst, murderous versions of themselves.

And they both, funnily enough, tell themselves and others that it was just fate. It was how things had to be. Inevitable.

This is a lie.

Eren always had the capacity for terrible violence. Jonas was always capable of manipulation and single-minded ruthlessness. Those are their character flaws. The sneak peeks they received of their futures weren’t showing them what they had to do. They made those choices of their own free will. As much as they fought against what they would become, as much as they protested that isn’t me, it was them. And they become those monsters anyway.

It’s only inevitable in the way a tragedy is inevitable.

Tragedies come about because of characters’ choices and flaws—not because the author or the timeline or fate is puppeteering them into these horrible ends. Romeo and Juliet aren’t doomed to die because the opening narration tells us they do. They’re doomed to die because they’re young and impulsive and desperate to escape the cycle of hatred their families perpetuate. It’s a tragedy because they’re scared teenagers and because the feud that drove them together, apart, and then to death was pointless.

It wasn’t inevitable. At any point, they could’ve put down the loaded gun (narratively speaking) and walked away. Romeo didn’t drink the poison because he heard the opening lines about him taking his life. Juliet didn’t watch the rest of the play and go alas, I have no choice, ‘twas foretold. O happy dagger! No! They both made those choices because of who they are as characters and the circumstances they were in.

But because we’re the audience, and we’ve been told the ending, we feel trapped in it. We’re the ones being granted a sneak peek into the future. We watch the story unfold with growing horror, because there are so many outs!

Romeo could have not killed Tybalt. Juliet could have entrusted her letter to a faster rider. They could have just not gotten married after eighteen hours. They could have spilled the secret and asked for help. This entire tragedy seems so preventable—but we’re trapped watching it happen regardless.

So when Eren says he has no choice, he’s not saying that because his vision of the future locked him into that course of action. Eren chooses to start the rumbling because that’s what Eren would do. He tells us himself—his disappointment in the outside world made him want to flatten everything and start anew.

Jonas too chooses to become the worst version of himself because he believes only he can make the world right. He has to—he feels responsible, like he doesn’t have any other choice. He wants to destroy the timeline and his family. He wants to tear it all down, because he can’t let go of the people he loved and lost.

The future does not dictate Eren’s and Jonas’s actions. Eren’s and Jonas’s characters dictate the future.

Maybe seeing themselves do it in the future helped them give permission to themselves to start something so unthinkable—but make no mistake. It was always just them.

(And I don’t say this as a condemnation of either character. We have all had those impulses. Sometimes we just want to tear it all down.)

But getting that glimpse into the future doesn’t absolve them of their choices, either. These two always had another choice. They just chose causing the apocalypse every single time.

(Well, that’s not completely true. Dark and Attack on Titan have different endings—Jonas receives new information that changes his perspective on everything. He learns the truth about the time knot, and that growth and recognition is enough to help him finally make a different choice—one that actually ends the loop. Eren could have made a different choice, too. He just doesn’t.)

Dark sums it up better than I ever could: “Man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.” In other words: You can do whatever you want, but you cannot make yourself want to do something else. Time travel only highlights that struggle for us.

[vonlipvig]

in light of all that happened today, and if we may all be a little less serious and a little more silly for a moment, i am once again asking if anyone else is seeing the max and george blades of glory vision.

[5hark-byt3]

“Oh where’s the sequin”

“Where’s the sequins”

1 ATE 1T!!!!! <- got lazy

[autisticlalna]

recently in the sbk community discord: leon, is the moon big?

its been a while since ive done one of these, whoops. im still pretty tired, but something pretty interesting is going on i wanna make sure everybody's caught up on.

it starts a little bit before Leon's episode 17, "Something is VERY WRONG on the Skyblock Kingdoms SMP..." when we got a sudden teaser:

uh oh, gamers.

the discord jumps on checking Leon's namemc and get a better look at his tattered skin:

(^ courtesy of Aces! also this, which is not relevant but makes me laugh):

what with the end of the season on the horizon, the telescope, and Leon's physical state, we jumped straight to Moon Big jokes. then, another teaser:

what's it?

oh, frig, the Stronghold book. remember that thing?

fun fact: in an Avid stream i don't have energy to track down the clip of (7/18/24), he mentioned he was the one that wrote it OOC. i don't remember what else he said about it, but it's still around and is being kept at spawn. neat.

then Leon's premiere goes up and Rex notices something in the description.

out-of-body experience?

finally, the premiere itself.

One chilly, rainy evening. I had just finished admiring my pile of diamond tools. Before calling it a night, I decided to head upstairs and sit by the fire for a while. Rest the bones, warm the feathers, yaknow. When all of a sudden... A gust of wind, a burst of flame! Then, nothing. I blacked out.

[phantom screech] One quick thing before I go--

This wasn't like with the chorus fruit. This was very, very different. When I came to, I had this feeling of dread, of- of fear and- and paranoia, that I just couldn't shake. Constantly in my mind, constantly, I couldn't stop thinking: Something out there is.. watching.

and then his speech at the end.

I know you're out there. Fool me twice, shame on me, I'm not falling for this again! You got me before, but this time I'm standing my ground. I love this world and the people in it, and I swear on every fiber of my being you are not going to take this from me! He's out there, and I know it.

so.. not only is Leon being watched, but it's something he has history with.

[legundo voice] WELL THAT'S OMINOUS.

wait, hey, that's a fun transition. speaking of Legundo...

let's take a quick detour into the series Leon was in before SBK, UHC Generations. the core concept is that you're in ultra hardcore (so no natural regeneration), but when you die you pass the world on to someone else. Leon was the third generation, and after over half a year of owning the world he decided to end the series on his own terms, intentionally fell to his death, and passed it on to Josh CodeNeon. Josh later died himself and passed it onto Legundo, but not before building a little spot around a campfire where he was able to summon the ghosts of previous generations to talk to them.

cut to last month and Legundo's episode 5, "I Need To Fix This...", where he decides he needs to build a gold farm. one of Leon's big contribution to UHCG was redstone farms, so Legundo summoned his spirit for a quick chat as he showed off his idea on how to get the farm to work. there's some fun things from their conversation, though:

Legundo: How’s unexistence? Leon: Aw man, it’s a lot of void. I’ve missed this place Legundo: Some firm ground underneath your feet, nice memory Leon: It’s lovely, I haven’t felt the warmth of a campfire in a while, yeah

[Leon gets attacked by phantoms.] Legundo: Oh no, they don’t like that you're back Leon: Oh no, oh no, my ghost body is being eaten by phantoms Phantoms: [screech]

and, most importantly...

Leon: Ok, ok, well, you know on that note, one quick thing before I go, just uh, wanted to let you know. Legundo: Yea [zooms in on Leon’s face.] Leon: Will is coming.

(transcription by ComposerNicholas, just edited for formatting)

an out-of-body experience, huh?

One quick thing before I go.

Legundo called Leon back to UHC Generations while Leon was on Skyblock Kingdoms. Leon passed out on SBK, helped Legs out on UHCG, gave Legs a warning, and then woke up on SBK with sudden paranoia.

and we're still not done! because at the end of Leon's SBK episode, we get this:

(image brightened for visibility, sorry about the artifacting)

and ComposerNicholas pointed out that Leon's first UHCG episode has this in the intro:

in his UHCG finale, Leon describes the flashes of alternate realities and glitches he's been subjected to as the world nudging him to move on. it's tired of him, it needs new blood and to grow and change with fresh faces and new ideas. so it's time for Leon to go. Legundo himself later mentions "the will of the world"-- the world is as alive as the people that make it.

Legundo's episode ends on him giving himself a timer. either he dies before the timer ends, or he follows in Leon's footsteps and dies on his own terms to pass the world on. after all, he'd pretty much found a way to eliminate all risk of ultra hardcore, and Leon had reminded him what the true point of UHCG was. he can't stay here forever. as the generations say: death is inevitable.

..in ultra hardcore, anyway. not so much in Skyblock Kingdoms, no matter what the thing watching Leon wants him to think.

You got me before, but this time I'm standing my ground. I love this world and the people in it, and I swear on every fiber of my being you are not going to take this from me!

to try and wrap this up, here's some more words from Leon as we go further into insanity:

anyway, this is what i've been able to scrape together so far. as usual, im just able to collect the pieces and maybe tape some of them together. we got a very brief Nukeri in Viking's episode the same day as Leon's, and now we've.. i dunno, got hints about Legundo? but the more focal thing seems to be that the UHCG world may have convinced Leon to pass it on, but that doesn't mean he's free of it. part of him is always going to be there, in the memorials and by the campfire.

oh yeah also quillbee did a video where he rebuilt founder's town from memory and invited leon on to help

[hiemaldesirae]

unbelievable

[sunb0ts]

started watching a:tla a few days ago :) hope you are well hi mutuals

[silver-horse]

bioware really said "let's release it on halloween... it's so terrible... it's gonna scare the shit out of everyone...the perfect halloween"

[camgoloud]

he still has his tonsils. by the way if you even care

[moonchild-in-blue]

Massive thank you to you and everyone else who calls out how shitty it is to get mad at peoples interpretations. Sleep tokens music is romantic. Its also toxic. These statements can coexist. Its not your business if someone plays bloodsport or vore or hell even atlantic at their wedding. Youre not them, you dont know what the music means to them. If you see a weird take just roll your eyes and move on, its not a big deal. Absolutely sick and fucking tired of all these "why are you calling this romantic/sexy? Youre stupid and a terrible person!" takes like fucking relax. Media literacy is important yes. Respecting that this music is dark and personal to vessel is also important. Same goes for respecting how people relate to the music in dark ways. But as long as people are not saying things directly to vessel or fans about how their individual trauma is sexy then just chill out and respect peoples different interpretations. It sucks that i cant talk about how i view certain songs without being called horrible things and having really fucked up vitriol aimed at me. Yall need to grow the fuck up and get over yourselves. Im not thinking of your personal shit when i call a certain song romantic/sexy, i dont even know you, sometimes im thinking of my own trauma actually lol. Lets all discuss this music maturely where we respect each other and what each of us as individuals bring to the table for interpretation, stop making this fandom toxic as hell for anyone who doesnt agree 100% with your own interpretation. (Also the whole "youre not allowed to say this song is romantic/sexy" thing is very dismissive of some peoples trauma in itself, it ignores how messy someones feelings toward their abusers/toxic partners can be. Pretty fucked up to call a trauma survivor stupid or a terrible person because a song reminds them of their positive feelings towards someone who hurt them) Anyways yeah, just tired of people being so harsh because they refuse to see other peoples perspectives. I genuinely think one of the most toxic aspects of this fandom is the vitriol over different interpretations, people act like outright children at times with it im ngl, especially with more sexual discussions. It also feels infantilizing towards vessel at times, hes a grown adult who put romantic/sexy elements in his music and he doesnt need people trying to protect him from those themes. Im rambling but this stuff pisses me off so much, this fandom needs to do better

Context post for the clueless ones - regarding my tags/replies

Here's the thing - I've been in fandoms for many, many, MANY years. This type of discussion isn't anything new nor unique to Sleep Token, but it sure does make a comeback quite often. It's tiring to keep repeating the same things over and over, but that's what fandom is all about isn't it?

Someone needs to say something, and I am not one to shy away from uncomfortable conversations like these. Something something, build your own community, be the change you wanna see, etc etc.

I've said pretty much everything I wanna say already under that post, but for the sake of clarity, and because I can't keep my mouth shut apparently -

Under the cut for length - you know the drill:

Music is art. And art is subjective. Meaning, each individual will have their own personal connection and interpretation of a given piece of art, which in this case is Sleep Token's music.

Did Vessel write the songs with a certain intent or meaning? Most likely yes! It's not hard to connect the dots and guess what events/emotions might've transpired and served as inspiration for them (accuracy to personal life is irrelevant and none of our business, but it's also no rocket science to understand what's been said).

Can we establish a base meaning for any given song, or better, can we have a general consensus of what a song is about based on its lyrics and themes? Absolutely! Not every song is like that, but we can all agree there's a lot of recurring themes of past relationships and mental health struggles.

Is it wrong to diminish the songs to one basic element (eg. the sexual undertones) and/or completely disregard the bigger, more important theme? I'd say it is.

Giving Atlantic as an example (which as a lot of you know, is my most favourite song of them and very dear to me): this one has some very blatant references to suicide and depression. Regardless of whether it is based on irl events or not (none of our business!!!), it is extremely heavy and emotionally charged. I find it incredibly disrespectful when people say random stuff during the rituals when he plays this one.

Or for example, how certain people reduce Sleep Token to "baby making metal", instead of acknowledging the insane (insane!) variety of genres and the profound lyricism they present.

Should we limit our views, and by extension, those of others, to surface-level interpretation, without allowing room for different views and interpretations, either fictional lore based or not? ABSOLUTELY NOT.

Vessel himself said to "not restrict ourselves to labels or genres because music transcends it all" (paraphrasing here). It's literally their whole thing. It's very hypocritical to be shouting from the rooftops about "media literacy" and assuming people are stupid or idiots for not understanding the basic, surface-level meaning of a song, when Vessel himself constantly writes in metaphors and half-truths.

I've touched on this a lifetime ago on one of my analysis, but if you *actually* look at the lyrics, you'll realise Vessel hardly ever says what he means. There's always something else behind his words, something he purposefully keeps hidden. It really sneaks upon you sometimes! I'm over a year in and I still find something new everyday on their music. That man has a way to weave in a hundred and one statements under a single sentence, that is just truly beautiful to study.

Is, say, The Love You Want, about a man (Vessel) mourning the fact that his love isn't reciprocated? Yeah! Is it about someone who, despite knowing they can never receive from their lover the attention and affection and care they want, will stay by their side anyways? It is!

Is it about bitterness, spiteful accusations aimed at the one person who should love you fully? Or a reflection of how little self-regard the singer has, so much that they are willingly and actively choosing to stay in a sinking one-sided relationship, because the alternative is too painful to bare? Can you flip the switch and see it as someone who is obsessively pursuing another person, and painting themselves as a victim? All of this, yes!

You can even eliminate the romantic aspect all together and apply it to a relationship with the self (past or future, or an alter ego), or a parental figure. The options are endless. There isn't one universal truth when it comes to music, and as such, all of these takes are 100% correct.

Many statements can be true at the same time - it doesn't make one more true or correct than the other. Simply different. The way we connect with music is very much dictated by our own life experiences, and no two people have lived the exact same life.

Can you prefer a certain way to look at a song, or completely disagree with certain takes? Absolutely! I know I sure as hell do! That's normal and expected and part of the fun in being in a community such as ours. More people means more ways to look at a song - isn't that just wonderful?!

Now, this is very obvious for most of us, but some people, especially in the younger rage, have been taught to look at things in a very black and white way. Not to be that person, but the truth is that the rise in awareness of social issues and "pc-ness", is slowly starting to eliminate the possibility of things being flawed and nuanced.

If you're wrong, you're awful. If you're right, you're obnoxious. Made a mistake? Get cancelled. Grow from your mistakes, but not like that. Learn from your actions, but change your whole personality in a day otherwise you're problematic.

You know what I mean.

Life isn't black and white. Art isn't black and white. Music isn't black and white. What may seem like a toxic, dark, obsessive depiction of a relationship to you, might translate to the deepest and most truest of loves to me. I can acknowledge something is Not Right, while still drawing my own conclusions.

Is Blood Sport a sad af song? Yeah! Definitely not the first thing I'd think of when in a happy relationship. But maybe that's the point. And maybe I do. And that's okay, and none of anyone's business. "Okay but The Apparition isn't a good example of a healthy and romantic-" TO YOU! Maybe that's what love looks like to me! Maybe I just happen to be into it! And what about it?

Maybe to me love comes with all the ugly sides too. The violence, the despair, the self-doubt. Who are you to dictate what I can or can't think? I highly doubt Vessel would go 🗣️ "WRONG! NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT! >:::(", so why would you?

You can, and should, discuss the songs with others! Maybe some people do genuinely need a fresh pair of eyes to help them get to the juicy core of the songs - that's why we're here! To discuss, and exchange ideas! You can, and should, call people out when their engagement with the music is being harmful to others (joking and laughing during Missing Limbs? No bueno. Speculating about Vessel's personal life? VERY no bueno. Choosing a potentially weird song to walk down the aisle? None of your business + not your wedding + you weren't even invited + none of your business. Notice how I've been repeating that. Notice again).

You shouldn't, however, shame and ridicule others for having different views from you.

I think, rather than engaging in pointless discussions and start accusing people of being this or that, we should all exercise a little "don't like? scroll past". Is it harming you or others? No? Then scroll past! Is it an awful, truly horrendous take about something you're really passionate about? Okay! Disgusting! Scroll past! Good for them! 👍

Also - keep an open mind. We're all doing this living businesse for the first time, no one holds all the answers to everything. It's okay to change your mind. It's okay to say the wrong thing and backtrack. It's okay to make a mistake and learn and grow.

You know what's not okay? Being a dick to others because the thing you like is being misinterpreted. It's hard, I know!!! You can block people! You can scroll past! You can look at pictures of your favourite vessel and cleanse your brain!!!! I know I do!!!!!

And this is a last afterthought but - you don't get to complain about the fandom you're in if you're doing nothing to change that. I see many, maaaaany of you bitch about this and that, while having 0 engagement aside from the bitching. Like?? Maybe if you spent more time reblogging cool art or gifs and less time whining about literally everything, this would be a much more pleasant space!! And I DO get to be a little petty here because I sure do try my best to make this a fun and nice community. I am allowed a little bitching 😌

Anyways, tl/dr: don't be a dick; don't like - don't engage; keep an open mind; gaze upon the vessels. Peace and love yall 💙💫