#its the main reason im weird about politics

[maaaxx]

I think it's important to remember that not only is it important to tag things with 'unreality' (or something similar) for people who struggle with delusions and paranoia, but also people (and by people i mean myself) who are way too gullible for the internet.

[pantestudines]

I dont think I'll ever really have the pc, time, or following to ever actually stream something, but if I did I know exactly what it would be. I'd title it "Space Truckin'" and I'd be playing 2003's Freelancer (a game so unknown here that I could find three whole posts about it, but that I am personally obsessed with). This game is a space dogfighting game, but instead of buying paramilitary war machines to blow up space hackers with, I'd limit myself to ONLY buying freighters and running cargo from place to place, severly dampening my combat abilities in the still-very-dogfight-focused main plot. I'm just a poor space trucker, dammit! I didn't want to get involved in intergalactic politics!

[qqueenofhades]

i registered to vote for the first time ( i feel old) now that im an adult but my state has closed primary elections which i was wondering if you have an opinion about. my initial thought was that its bad because i had to register democrat (rather than my states green party which represents my beliefs more) just so i could vote between democrat candidates, which feels like being pressured into supporting the weird pseudo two party system we have. but then i looked it up and apparently a reason for this is so that people from opposing parties wont purposefully mess up the votes just so that their preferred candidates have an easier time winning, and i think that makes sense too. but is that actually the reason theyve closed it or is it just to force us dem/republican?? cause it feels strange

Okay, look. I respect the fact that you're a young person, and I appreciate that you have not only registered to vote, but plan to vote in the primaries, so I don't want to lecture you too much. That said: I am taking you out for coffee, I am sitting you down, I am looking into your eyes, and I am urgently telling you the following:

The Green Party is a scam. It is a scam. It has existed for decades in American politics as an empty shell corporation weaponizing the good intentions of young people like yourself, because all it theoretically stands for "it's good to save the planet maybe." Which is not something that any non-insane person seriously disagrees with, but there is no world in which that cause is actually furthered by registering/voting Green (you mentioned that you did vote for Democrats, which -- good, but listen to me here, youngun, okay?) It ran Jill Stein in 2016 to siphon more votes from HRC, and this election it plans to run Cornel West, a pro-Russian tankie who positively equated Bernie and Trump, as another spoiler candidate. It does not stand for "protecting the planet" or America in any real way. It has never elected a single senator or congressman, let alone a president. It stands for empty performance/grievance political theater by those people who feel too morally superior to vote for/affiliate with Democrats, often because the internet has told them that it's not Cool or Hip or Progressive enough.

If your main priority is climate/the environment, you're doing the right thing by registering as a Democrat and voting for Democrats. (Also: the adjectival form is Democratic. It is the Democratic party and Democratic candidates, otherwise you sound like the Fox News host who wrote a book literally entitled "The Democrat Party Hates America.") They are the only major party who has in fact passed major climate legislation and have made environmental justice a central tenet of their platform. As opposed to the Republicans, whose Project 2025, along with the rest of its nightmare fascist prescriptions, openly pledges to completely wreck existing climate protections and forbid any new ones, just because we weren't all dying fast enough under their death-cult rule already. That's the main logical fallacy I don't get among both the Online Leftists and the American electorate in general: "the Democrats aren't doing quite enough as I'd like, so I'll enable the active wrecking ball insane lunatics to get in power and ruin even the progress we HAVE managed to make!" Like. How does that even make sense?

On a federal level, the Greens have contributed nothing whatsoever of tangible value to American or international climate policy/legislation, environmental justice, or anything else, because as noted, they don't have any elected candidates and mostly focus on drawing voters away from Democrats. There might be plenty of good candidates on the local or city level, which -- great! Vote away for Greens if they're available, or the only other option is a Republican! But on the federal/primary level, please understand: once again, they are a scam. There is no point in affiliating yourself with them. You're welcome to register Green and vote Democratic, if that makes you feel better or if you prefer having another label next to your name, but once again, I'm telling you in my position as a salty Tumblr elder that they have done nothing but harm to the causes they claim to care about, because "environment" is such a nebulous priority and has demonstrably been hijacked to stop the American government entity, i.e. the Democrats, that is actually working to improve on it.

As for your question: nobody is "forcing" or "pressuring" you to vote in primaries. By your own admission, you made a conscious choice to register as a Democrat in order to vote for Democratic candidates. If you were just a regular registered voter of whatever party affiliation, you would vote in the general election for whatever candidate the primary process produced. But if you are sufficiently vested and committed to that process that you would like to have a say in who is running under that party label, it is not unreasonable that you would register as a member of that party. Nobody has twisted your arm behind your back and made you do so; you are taking a considerable level of initiative on your own. Likewise, open primaries can be both a good and bad thing. This falls under the "the political system we have is flawed, but we can't magically pretend it doesn't exist and act according to our own fantasyland versions of reality" thing that I keep saying over and over. So yes, if you want a role in shaping the Democratic candidates who emerge from a Democratic primary process, you will usually register as a Democrat, and nobody has forced you to do that. It's that simple.

Likewise as a general programming note: I'm trying to cut back on politics a bit right now, because I don't have the spoons/bandwidth/mental health to deal with it. I apologize. So if you've sent me a politics-related ask recently and haven't received a response, I'm not deliberately or maliciously ignoring you; I just am not able to handle it as much as usual and will have to put it on pause. However, I feel as if this is important enough to be worth saying, so, yeah.

[dustorange]

opinions?… 😬😬

https://www.tumblr.com/melmov/750293558453501952?source=share

link

Wfa =free, comics = $3.99 per -> subsidized demand -> market distortion -> :/ :(

The claim of that post—“people have gotten tired of unrelenting grimdark” e.g. actual DC main runs and therefore prefer “slice-of-life fluff [that] also presents a coherent, easy-to-enter, balanced storyline” e.g. WFA—is directionally accurate but its also sort of talking about a Different Group of People than DC Comics Readers.

in particular there is a group of people who have been pretty much totally deracinated from developing or being capable of developing their own opinions on media or humor or life. because of social media and maybe also they r very young. there is a general valence to that part of fandom: the incorrect quotes, the Canva-post-derived politics, the memetic vocab + jokes and like this weird very limited view of redditizedhistory and culture+literature consisteing of the binding of Isaac and twoheadedcalf poem. and so there is just genuinely not the ability to process things that haven’t been run through a filter of accessibility. and WFA, which has BEAUTIFUL art and lots of very sweet moments, IS super accessible and its also sort of been through the preapproved foundfamily neoliberal kitsch machine and come out with a passing grade. but yes it is missing that like elusive Something and it also lacks a seriousness and it isnt the Characters. it’s something else. And its so pretentious to say its for people who don’t have the like stamina ??? for longerform storytelling but yes if you pressed me i would say its a bunch of people, primarily young genz and millennial girls/women, whose critical mental faculties and attention spans have been fried by social media and underexposure to challenging original content

that’s a different new group being lassoed into dc stuff from the previous existing audience. The DC Comics Reader People. i don’t know how much of this to do gender politics with but comics fandom has DEFINITELY gotten MUCH more female in the last 2 decades and there was a distinctive male comic book go-to-the-LCS-and-get-physical-copies and rigorously-autisticslly-fight-about-minutia-of-canon culture. Men also r going to be the one who GENERALLY prefer your fightheavy “”””grimdark””” comics, as opposed to women who doooo generally prefer social relational content. And also women-dominated comics fandom spaces are obviously qualitatively different from men’s fandom spaces. So PART of the reason WFA outsells real DC stuff is market distortion and PART is the DCfan genderdemographic shift that favors content like WFA

I rly hesitate to endorse a lot of Canon dc tumblr’s posts about the fanony WFA-style stuff bc it seems so clear that a the latter is enjoyed primarily by a group of very young people and it also feels like there’s a weird power imbalance intellectually between fanon and canon people. AND I AM A BIG BELIEVER IN LET PEOPLE READ AND ENJOY THE CONTENT THEY WANT and they shouldn’t be shamed for enjoying something as visually sweet and cute as WFA. and a lot of canon tumblr’s rants abt fanon stuff r clearly sort of excessively vicious and insecure attempts to feel superior. although admittedly quietly they r correct but it comes off cruel idk. also i think that BATMAN and superman and to some extent some others ARE indeed very flexible in terms of what is canon and what you have to consume to have consumed The Character and The Story. ive never seen BTAS but as far as im concerned, someone who has only watched BTAS is someone who has the right to do whatever batman stuff they want.

Related questions are: Is mainline DC batman stuff GOOD right now? and Is WFA good? I agree that mainline DC stuff isnt the best right now and i haven’t read WFA so i can’t comment on its quality but i honestly don’t think its the case that “WFA is better written than actual Batman comics, so thats why WFA is more popular” lol

[yahoodarling]

Gn Self Aware reader, no blatant 'yandere' themes developed yet. About 700 words.

Figured id post this, an unfinished set up of a fic i started and didnt finish. Reread it and im considering picking it back up since the concept is interesting.

Self aware reader determined not to change the events of Inazumas 'plot' finds themself in a little problem. Such problem being that this is a yandereAyato (and or Thoma) fic.

It's disgusting. It is discomfort incarnate to have such foresight into the fate of the world and yet be bound to its own laws of destiny, especially when what you were sure was to take place is altered. You no longer have any ground of understanding except the uncanny feeling that things are not as they should be, to be so similar and yet be so changed. You knew things will end up alright, as long as you do not interfere then Inazumas political warfare will reach a peaceful end and it did. You watched, noted those ‘special’ to the world, those who have a story, a life, a reason and you took the responsibility of not getting involved and it worked. You became an npc, avoided any confrontation with those deemed ‘special’, avoided any influence in the ‘plot’, watched as a hero came, a nation saved and a people newly united. It worked. Your foresight was correct yet… things changed. With no base to rely on, how were you to know what the ‘future’ must be, how were you to know what to avoid, who to avoid and what minor choice may change a future?

The hero has left, gone to Sumeru you guess, no, you know, you know the hero leaves for a new nation but so has your foresight and with that comes the change.

The one day gathering supplies, one day speaking to a fellow npc to fill some sort of social need, one day being in the ‘dark’ and you've caused a spark.

“Oh Aoi, good morning to you!”

He didn't speak to you, it was directed to the npc shopkeep you were chatting with and yet it grabbed your attention. Thoma is ‘special’, Thoma is relevant and so he must be avoided and you failed. 

Thoma spoke of how lovely the nights have been, of the soft whistles of sea, even to npcs Thoma was a gentleman starting conversation. He then turned to you with a smile,

"A good day to you as well! Im Thoma."

He commented on how ‘unique’ your eyes are, a depth to them hes never seen before. That comment frightened you, made you rush to leave, to stop the change. Quickly you felt a hand on your shoulder,

“Please excuse my rudeness but how about we have a stroll? I know its unfair of me to ask a stranger such a thing but… you remind me of a home away from home, if you would grant me such a pleasure that is.” he ended with a chuckle.

You have been so realistic up to this point, so good at avoiding ‘change’ but you have a heart and knew all too well that whatever feeling Thoma is experiencing is something important to him. You have a heart and so you accept. The main 'issue' of Inazuma is resolved, there is nothing else to truly be afraid of changing right? One time, only one time.

A single light hearted stroll became a weekly meet at the shop front, ‘coincidentally’, which became a personal relationship which became a friend. It's alright though, Thomas is a social guy, he's close with many npcs who never impacted the ‘plot’, you can be one such npc, that's fine. Change is fine. 

It's not fine. Meeting with Thoma you eventually met with other ‘special’ individuals you knew by name before they even knew of your existence. It's a weird feeling to know a person before getting to meet them, all the private details, their worries, their joys and yet forced to remain oblivious to it.

“A formal greeting from the Kamisato Clan, I am glad to see Thoma has a new friend. Do treat him well, sadly I must make short of this meet.” and the man who is most likely the most influential to whatever ‘plot’ is to come of Inazuma greeted. Kamisato Ayato was amongst your top ‘DO NOT ENGAGE’ list other than the archon herself and yet somehow naive bliss and a VERY convincing plea(almost suspiciously good) from Thoma to have lunch by the beaches near the residence of the Kamisato Clan lead you right into his ‘life’.

You have no ‘life’, you are meant to have no ‘life’, no value or effect and yet by each interaction with those deemed ‘special’ by the world your plans crumble.

["Your tears remind me of the rain, both comforting and disturbing. How i cringe at each drop yet yern to hear them patter against me. My dear please do remember for each storm or drizzle you bring to me i will open my arms for which ever embrace you bring."- shit i was going to add once i built up to it but seems i lost interest before i got to that.]

[hikari-ni-naritai]

emily talks about the shit shes watching this season bc shes bored and doesnt want to go to sleep yet. under the cut bc shes watching a lot of things.

eh. this shows like if they forgot to put the good in no game no life. its less clever and has less tension. this is the one where they act like girls with like solid D or E cups are completely flat.

not very good! this is the one where hes like 'well what if they had a good reason to attack children?' the plot that feels like the overarching conflict is resolved by episode 6. and none of the stuff thats happening has like any subtlety at all. it used to feel like a shitty knockoff of shin no nakama but now that that part's over it just doesnt feel like anything.

eh. im not a fan of the vibe of this show. its like if a harem anime replaced the girls' character development with him having sex with them. if you want a show about someone who gets a bunch of skills really quickly from eating monsters watch spider isekai or arifureta or bofuri.

this show rules. the op and ed both slap. its really weird. its one of those ones where itd be foolish to say whether its good or not until the final episode, but its been really good so far. the only thing to complain about is that everyone talks really fast all the time.

...Perfecting My Magical Ability! this is the show where they keep putting this little boy in cunty outfits. the animation is stellar and the humour is solid. the magic system is detailed enough to keep me intrigued and the main character is insane (and lia-core) enough to make me love him. a wonderful little treat for emily and easily one of my favourites this season. though if youre uncomfortable with scantily clad girls you will probably not like it.

's aight yknow. the guy's at least a vocal opponent of slavery and discrimination. but beyond that kind of a nothing show. he doesnt use his level 2 super cheat powers very often.

its the remake of popular anime Spice and Wolf. i never saw the original but as youd expect from a show that was good enough to get a remake in the same animation medium, its pretty good. i like holo. shes very a wolf that looks like a girl.

i like tsukimichi. this is season 2 and it's got a bit of season 2 syndrome but not the worst case ive seen. i would say its not as good as season 1 though. but we're about to get into a big fighty bit so maybe it'll get better.

yurucamp season 3! i dont like the new art style, but that happens when new seasons come out years after the original. at least it didnt get as bad a change as masamune-kun's revenge did. the content though continues to be great! im glad nadeshiko's friend went camping with them, her interactions with rin were super cute. my biggest complaint is that sakura nee san isnt in here as much. i miss her.

ughhh. its not very good. i know this is a common trope, but i really dont like the whole 'you are born with a certain level of talent that determines what you'll be good at and how good you will be at it' thing and this takes it to a whole other level. plus the politics are like. idealistic and not well executed? it just bothers me.

yeah i know his earrings are racist. but i love the animation style and i dont think im going to be throwing my support behind the Japanese Empire. block me if you must. anyway this started late so its only a couple episodes in. im sad that yellow boy returned bc i hate him. whats his face has some really excellent scars. thats all i have to say

mushoku tensei continues to be one of the best isekai ever made. in the second cour of season 2, rudy seems to be a lot less . um. prone to sexual misconduct, now that he's married. the episode about his sister norn was kind of a masterpiece. the animation's good as always, and im eager to find out where this current arc leads. it should be great tho!

this one's premise is 'a lanky looking guy beat Sword Art but got stuck in the post-game 500 years after the fact'. theres an elf girl who wears a really cute jacket. eminently watchable and something i'll probably rewatch at some point, but not really anything special as of right now.

ill be honest its hard to recommend this one on account of Everything Is Wrong With It. season 3 has largely traded in the 'people are oppressed bc theyre lazy' politics of season 1 for more classic 'the chinese are evil' politics. i dont really even know why im bothering honestly. its not even isekai.

as they say in the op, 'yes, we are still going'. its a third season of konosuba. megumin continues to be best girl.

astoundingly mid. they spent the first 6 episodes talking at long tables, then proceeded to have a fight stemming from miscommunication that nobody bothers to resolve despite at the very least suspecting it. at least the girl fighting the slime is cute. at least the rampant misogyny has been toned down.

honestly a treat! started kinda slow but has become a fun and heartfelt experience. a reverse isekai about a princess from another world who wants to become a detective, and her loyal retainer who accidentally becomes the new god of a cult and starts a rock band with a sex worker and the cult leader. really lives up to its name.

SOMEHOW the show whose synopsis is "a lonely sorcerer buys an elf as a slave because he fell in love with her at first sight" is NOT the most reprehensible romance of the season. that dishonour of course belongs to unnamed memory. legally speaking shes not a slave anymore, but she just. wears the huge ass fuckin slave collar around? she can take it off on her own apparently but god i wish she would just not put it back on! anyway. slavery aside (and that is a big aside) honestly pretty cute. im intrigued by the magic system.

dungeon meshi. ah, dungeon meshi. 's good. yaknow. what more is there to say?

[cartoonrival]

obtio and itachi for the character bingo. actually lets also go with sasuke lets get the whole uchiha family drama in here

ok i did this bingo a while ago w obito but im doing it again because my opinion is more developed since we've now discussed him at length. i think he's fucking annoying and his significance in the final arc is absolutely bizarre and deeply undeserved.

obito's significance in the story should begin and end at kakashi's backstory. like you've talked about, to kakashi, obito is more of a symbol than a person; kakashi was deeply traumatized (understandably) by obito's final moments, and is infinitely plagued with guilt over the person that he was at that time, blaming himself for his friends' deaths even though it wasn't actually his fault. he had no respect for obito until obito's final moments, where he sacrificed himself for kakashi and gifted him HIS EYE, GOUGED FROM ITS SOCKET AND SWAPPED WITH KAKASHI'S, HEALED INTO PLACE BY HIS 12 YEAR OLD TEAMMATE, finally making kakashi understand that looking out for the people you love moreso than the mission itself is honorable, actually. obito represents what kakashi should be and what he was unable to be, a point of failure and something to strive towards and fall short of forever. the horror of obito's death is emblematic of what's wrong with konoha and the ninja system in general-- why was rin, a child, taken prisoner? why was it left up to kakashi and obito, children, to rescue her alone? why were the three of them on the battlefield to begin with, KAKASHI AS THE TEAM LEADER? children gouging their eyes out as parting gifts. obito cared about kakashi from the beginning enough to give him an actual piece of himself, but kakashi couldn't be assed to give him the time of day until the moment obito died (because he was 1) an asshole as a child (love and light!) and 2) also traumatized by his father's SUICIDE (ALSO A BYPRODUCT OF WAR) which shaped his world view in an extremely rigid way), and THIS should haunt him forever. he can grow from it and make new connections and try his damnedest to make up for it, but obito should NOT come back. there is NO REASON for him to come back. he is not even SLIGHTLY an interesting enough character in his own right to justify him coming back, especially not as a MAIN PLAYER IN THE FINAL BATTLE. HUH?

his obsession with rin, a girl who ALSO had zero personality and thus i don't care at all about their relationship with each other, was absolutely bizarre and ridiculous, the way he hung onto it i understand objectively was a symptom of his stunted emotional growth and being a very broken man, but the way this was executed was MISERABLY done, no one cares, shut the fuck up, she didn't even like you (she liked kakashi, for some fucking reason, weird to make that like her only personality trait just for kakashi to not even like her back). like his anger that kakashi didn't protect her is 1) sexist but we know this (she is apparently incapable of protecting herself) and 2) annoying because again, this would serve much better as just another failure notch in kakashi's fuckup belt, but instead this dude comes back at the age of 32 to be like ooououuuugh all i wish is to hold hands with the girl i had a crush on when i was 12 and know nothing about..... SHUT THE FUCK UPPPPP

and obviously the fandom. fucking. KAKASHI/OBITO???? REALLY????? kakashi cares about obito because he was his teammate and a symbol of his personal failures, and obito sacrificed himself for kakashi because he was a kindhearted child and both of them were raised as war machines. how the fuck does that ever ever translate to romantic attraction. ever. what. they weren't even actual friends. why is this so popular. like in what world.... IN WHAT WORLD............

itachi....... itachi............i loveyou......... i mentioned this in a previous post but to me itachi is gen the POSTERCHILD of everything that is so wrong with the political system. he grew up SWALLOWED by it and chewed up and spit back out. his father took him to a battle field when he was like 4 literally just so he'd see what it was like. he was raised as a double agent and brainwashed so seamlessly that by the end he didn't even know whose side he was actually on. absolutely fascinating character and heartbreaking and devastating and horrible. ive never never never seen siblings written as well as kishimoto wrote sasuke and itachi, because LITERALLY WHO CAN GROW ME A NEW BROTHER... itachi loved sasuke more than anything. im convinced that if you dont think he loved sasuke then you weren't watching. obviously, what he did was terribly cruel and he ruined sasuke's entire life and no amount of i love you and im sorry can fix or change that, but he loved him. driven to do something unspeakably horrible by the government officials who had groomed him into a killing machine, setting the fate of his clan and the village and potentially beyond that on his teenaged shoulders, but he had to spare his brother. like itachi is deeply deeply brainwashed by konoha and this is something that he never gets over; he spares sasuke and drives him to hate him because he's afraid what would happen if sasuke crossed konoha, what konoha would do to him, he thinks that maybe he's doing the right thing and protecting the village, maybe, if sasuke grows up strong, stronger than him, no matter what it takes, then maybe he'll fare better than itachi did. but also there needs to be someone left to hate him for it. itachi can't bare to get out where everyone who knew him, who could really really hate him like he deserves to be hated, is dead. its selfish, obviously its fucked. but he needs it and he's terrified.

itachi's manipulation of sasuke's entire life is frankly very very fascinating and horrible to me, the willingness to rewrite and rewrite sasuke's beliefs and control every aspect of what he knows and believes and wants to a desperate attempt to keep him safe and to keep the village that fucked them both over safe. normally i think bringing characters who already got their epic death scene back from the dead cheapens the weight of the original death, but with itachi i actually think his return is sort of critical just because it breaks my heart so fucking bad. sasuke please don't call me perfect. sasuke this is everything i did wrong and im sorry and i love you and im not going to control you anymore. whatever you think is right, ill always love you. like itachi fucked up irrevocably. but man. thats his brother. thats his baby brother. we are fucked. i think given time sasuke will not think as highly of itachi as he does when the story ends and i think this would be a fantastic development to watch, but where things stand and considering how the rug has been pulled out from underneath him about one billion times i think its fully understandable that he has the take that he does by the storys end.

itachi was not a good brother, obviously, christ, but he DID love sasuke and i think what happened to them both is horrific

SASUKEEEEE i love a guy who doesn't know what he is doing or what he wants he just hates himself and his life and is terrified of weakness or connection or love and he gets led around by his nose because he's so full of hate and fear and anger that anyone who can help him direct it LITERALLY FCUKING ANYWHERE is immediately someone he will stand beside, until he changes his mind again. like im going to be sick. HES SO FUCKED. its crazy i think how little im about to write about him bc i think without direction my brain sort of looks just like @#**)#!H@FUIBEW*(#@*(WESDU@* *CWF)*WCF wrt sasuke.

was he right? umm im generally anti-tyranny but he was on the right track. it fucking sucks that kishimoto is so scared of change. im so glad he killed danzo. i fucking hate team taka though that was lame as hell idrk why kishimoto was afraid to just let him walk a lonely road the only road that he has every known and instead had to give him a bunch of tonally dissonant goons. devastating. what the fuck even. "you are the only person left who loves me and that terrifies and unsettles me so badly that i desperately need to kill you so that you'll stop and i'll really be alone" is an absolutely insane and also gay character motivation.

post canon sasuke is i think what makes me the most miserable with him (and im trying to get into this w b2, we'll see how successful i am) because i think its like. wow. what kind of person even are you after spending 7 odd years like how sasuke spent them. who even are you. what are you doing. what are you GOING to do. how do you know you won't change your mind and start hurting people again. how do you know you wont change your mind and start hurting yourself again. youre already hurting yourself. where are you. what is this. why are you alive. you should be dead. you deserve to be dead. you kind of wish you were dead. but also someone loves you and swears on his life that nothing in the world could ever make him stop, and you believe him and its so terrifying being known by yourself and by someone else but maybe things will be okay but maybe they wont and you hope that when the two of you die, its you first, because even though he says he never ever could you know he could get on without you but you have no idea who you'd be without him.

i wont rehash boruto because ive done that already but its critical as well. WHY DID YOU DO THAT TO HIM IM GONNA THROWUP

[istherewifiinhell]

okayyyy also. tagged by @joelletwo for 5 topics i could talk about for an hour with no prep.

now. two things. 1. i have infernal podcast dude energy and could say a lot about nothing. weird trait to have if u dont like talking to people? hard to say. 2. GESTURES AT BLOG. im ALREADY. talking at length abt my beloved shit. so im just ruling out turtles, alien robots, trek, etcetcetc all the shit thats been a main blog topic for the last past. 4 years?

I'm gonna say.... western voice actors? not that i could really. Give a lecture so much as. I'm way more familiar with them that than I am live action actors. And I'm kinda just CONSTANTLY like. Oh you know so and so from every cartoon youve ever fucking seen? And FEEL a real. gap. with people when they dont have a same reference point. probably like how ppl feel with me when i dont know their acting guys jhadbgjfga. Like u can name 5 VAs from ur childhood cartoons/animated movies right? And personal interest like, hey btw u know like the entire cast of tng was in disneys gargoyles? U know keith david can SING? And diego luna? Hey you know about Canadian actors who are in all the dubs and video games and yeah cheap shit? You know Scott McNeil right? You know Ian James Corlett? You know. THE IAN. of being Ian. Hello. is this thing still on?

I really like and care about the topics of education, children's rights and pedagogy? Not academically so much as, personal interest. What seeing very clearly that there was a lot of arbitrary rules that involved things like. The Government. and Systems. as a child does to a motherfucker I guess? I'm always INTERESTED in a discussion about it, is how i mean I guess. Like focuses of multiple intelligence and "applied knowledge" (and short comings there of). I mean long and short of it. Kids are full human beings and until u can grapple with that their feelings and opinions um. Actually matter. I hate you? jdhbgjhdb. And Naturally the world being good for kids has the prerequisite of it not sucking ass for adults too....

UHhhh guh. User design/civil engineering? You'll hear it from me until the day I die, crushed under the tires of a ford f1 giga truck with the LED 20million watt bulbs. PROTECTED BIKE LANES. for the love of god. I just know a lot of designers I guess and like engineering, conceptually. But like, u know that famous bridge everyone crashes into. If theres 80million warning signs and people are still crashing... maybe theres. other factors. Or you know ofc like, traffic planning, vehicle accidents, structural disasters. A lot of them are not just. Things happening. Tragedies. There's politics there. Usually a lot of Money stuff. and structural racism. The real reason your fridge is full is that there's a bunch of half empty condiment jars hiding all your forgotten left overs. And widening the roads isnt gonna do shit for traffic.

Jackass entry: Themes and motifs of anyyytthing ive watched with another person or saw, and like they also know it. I realllly like, visual theming and narrative shorthands. Anything that breaks like, maybe people in this setting dont have the same customs, but their gonna do something so you the audience can recognize it. Non literal/accurate use of colour and lighting, for mood and clarity. Breaking the physical shape and scale of things so they can appear and be readable on screen. COSTUMING COSTUMING COSTUMING. A well styled character can do soooo much for your understanding of a work, especially with large casts, and a poorly styled one can take me right out. Well. anyway. yes i love animation u all knew that.

uhhhhh Thatgamecompany/giantsquids studio. im giving myself a free space. lol technically I DO. blog about this. the music. at least. BUT beloved. games. Me and everyone else I guess. Hey speaking of u know its laura bailey and troy baker as the voices in the pathless? And you know how a lot of the games have themes of coming into being/growing/rebirth. And LOTS of environmentalism. And implied cultural world building, and wordless stories. and beautiful metaphor rich otherworldly visuals. and gameplay styles that really connect with the emotional story their going for. and ofc, the music. oh the leit motifs. well. there u go. sword of the sea when?

tagginggg. uh did anyone get @deadgrantaires or @army-of-bee-assassins yet? anyone elseeee who wants to regale me with things they knowww about. id love to know.

[lanaevyssmoved]

hi fray bg3 you are one of the only people i trust with bg3. do you have any headcanon ages or heights for the main camp group (+ any extras u are particularly fond of). thank u hugs and kisses

im the worst person because im a day late to this. but yes. i will provide.. the headcanons

now these arent all like solid. im chill. these are liquidy headcanons that may change and be influenced. i would love to hear counter arguments in the replies also hehe

im doing lads first and then lasses for no reason other than im gale insane

gale

age - 45-55, i can entertain 30s if i have to but it's mostly just me being polite. i can also take him older because i fully believe he was chosen of mystra long enough for it to effect his aging. i like to think morena his mother is older than most people put her at (i think of her around her 80s - i love the idea of tara being a 'grandma' figure to gale and she's having her old lady parties with his mum). and that gives me playing room for age to be older, but not necessarily look as old as i put him at. but also i don't think gale's physical appearance is even that help, my ex who was 32 looked older than gale, my ex who was 55 looked younger than gale. my mother looks younger at gale at 59. so !!! i just like to play with middle aged hence the 10 year gap in my headcanon. i also think gale would lie about his age. ALSO!! he's a fucking wizard if you're not fucking about with a wizards age (and gender and sexuality) what are you doing. but also yes if you tell me you think gale is 37 or 38 i will nod and say that's ok. i can roll with that

height - i can put him anywhere from like 5'7" to 5'9"... i can't see him being taller. i just can't. afhiri is also 5'0" so like i gotta be realistic i don't want him to be a fucking tree she needs to climb. he still kind of is like this like i'm being KIND to the man i'm adding inches out of PITY. nah ok so i use the shorter height mod to make afhiri's model 5'0" under the assumption it's 5'7" by default, so when putting afhiri and gale next to each other with the mod enabled, he's roughly around 5'7" and 5'9", give or take because flat services are deceiving in this here video game....... 5'7" feels good though. feels organic.

wyll

age - bro confirms it i don't really have to say anything here. he's 24

height - i wanna give him a respectable 5'10" honestly. no real movement needed it just feels right. he's defo taller than gale for sure but more just feels uncomfortable to me.... but he definitely feels Taller....

astarion

age - 263.. this is just his age in idle champions. i dont fucking know

height - i think hes the smallest of the LadsTM i'm putting him around 5'5" - 5'6". barely anyone, if anyone, will agree with me on this. it's okay if you don't. if you think he's taller, i'll take his knees so i'm validated

halsin

age - once again canon aged at 350

height - well. i'm saying 6'4" - 6'5" i don't have much more to say on this. just feels correct. esp with new wood elf edition lore where "max height" for one is about 6'0" so he has to be big to 6'0". but i don't see it being more than this

minsc

age - well minsc age is weird but i assume he was like 40ish when he was frozen. or late 30s. i reallyyy enjoy the idea of him being so stupid but being at the age where society expects you to be smart. its beautiful to me. like poetry

height - bro is an easy 6'0"-6'1". this is absolutely not for lusty galexminsc reasons. it might be. ok it is. but also its right yknow? its right. im right. moving on

lae'zel

age - she's 22 in idle champs and i also enjoy the idea of her being the youngest in the group but also if she is 22. that means afhiri is older than lae. and i think that could be the cause of some friction... so yeah i can accept 22.

height - ok so. gith are typically very tall. you're gonna see the majority of gith around 6'0" to 7'0". sometimes they can be shorter than 6'0" but that's like rare. ur like insulted for being that small. you the RUNT egg. but i don't see lae'zel being so tall. i can see her being runty. i also talked this over with a friend and she agreed on runty egg. 5'9"-5'10" not entirely runty egg but.. still needs to over compensate for not being usual gith sized.

YEAH BABY GIVE THAT GITHYANKI A COMPLEX OR TWO!!!!!!!!! sorry lae ur dealing with ur young age AND ur small height

shadowheart

age - ive always seen shadowheart as young. she gives such intense teenage girl vibes sometimes like i just. shes not emotionally matured man. shes such a high school bitch when she wants to be. HOWEVER... she is canonically older than 40 because there are 40 years of documents on her life from when she was already giving up memories to shar. however it could just be all her life documented from the second she was taken by sharrans when she was a child. so shadowheart anywhere from like 50-60 years old. ish

height - hmmm around 5'4" - 5'5" ... average shart. :) feels organic. i once again have little to say

karlach

age - soo i've been thinking of this more recently and i change my mind on my original hc for her height. so now i think she was likely about 18 or 19 when she was sold to zariel and spent 10 years there so i'm thinking she's like 28 or 29 ^_^

height - 6'2". i feel pretty solid on this!! mostly because i'm 5'2" and i dated someone who was 6'2" and that height difference just feels Right for how much taller i think karlach would be to me

minthara

age - ouughgh we know she's over 200 years old but i think close to 200 is just too young for how she is. so i'm gonna say 300-400 but i'm more inclined to say she's closer to 400 than not. i think she's "middle-aged" ish for a drow and this is the best i got. drow experts feel free to chime in as long as u don't try to make her young. if u do that i'll eat u

height - well this made me find out that drow are a short race. 4'7" to 5'5" in height. so minthara simply has to be short. i assume she wears heels and stands on boxes to be taller because she likes to feel tall. but she's uh. she's small. i'm gonna say like 5'3" to 5'4". this is So funny to me

jaheira

age - about 150, but could be older! i don't see it being younger. bless someone on reddit writing this for me so i can just copy and paste but..... she says she's a 'small child' during the year of the bright blade so:

1347 DR = Year of the Bright Blade 1368 DR = BG1 1492 DR = BG3 124 years passed between the first and third games. 145 years passed since Year of the Bright Blade. A small child should be about 5 years +/- few years. Therefore, her age should be about 150 years.

thank you random reddit user!

height - 5'5" or 5'6" mostly going by my minsc headcanon and how their height difference looks to me in their cutscene together hehe.........

oh you said any extras i'm fond of.... i do not have the energy to even ATTEMPT to illithid right now so i'm gonna do it for barcus for fun . <3

barcus

age - i'm gonna say my boy is like. in his 60s-70s. :)

height - about 3'4" ish. averageyish gnome height. :)

i like barcus he's so divorced. he and gale are the most divorced men in baldurs gate 3. and theyre going to kiss. anyway

[fipindustries]

i think everyone has their wrestling. what do i mean by this?

one of the biggest surprises to me was when i discovered what wrestling really was. it seemed, from the outside, like just a bunch of silly fake fighting for no real reason but to make spectacle i guess. but then i learned that, wait, actually there are like storylines and shit. there are characters, there are character arcs, there is lore and the poeple who follow it have been following this rich tapestry of complex story telling for years and this is why they get so invested in it.

there are thousand examples like this, it doesnt have to be wrestling specifically, it can be V-tubers, it can be forum drama, it can be wikipedia intra editor fights. in my specific case, its politics streamers.

i tried to be more discreete about this in the past. politics is the mindkiller and i get the feeling political streamers fall near the bottom of respectable human beings. it might genuenly be a bit less cringy if i was into big brother or some other reality tv show. but whatever, this is one of the things im obsessed with, this is one of my main hyperfixations, ive been into this shit for years and im going to start being a bit less coy about it.

i want to bring up one some such example of the things ive seen in that side of the internet.

to this day i maintain that the entire mr. girl/destiny saga is one of the most fascinating, disturbing, most interestingly written and weird stories ive seen in my life. imagine if a pathological narcissist, with a history of manipulation, emotional abuse, and overall being a giant creep tried to do his whole song and dance with a popular streamer to get clout and popularity but it just so happens that the mark he chose turned out to be a cold sociopath who cannot be bullied or manipulated moved by emotion or human conection.

it was truly some death note level shit, it was L and light all over again, the most fucked up game of cat and mouse that i followed breathlessly for months. it was delightful to watch this strange, disturbing creature try to sink its teeth on what it thought was just one more person and finding out the other guy was even more fucked up and distrubed than he was.

the ensuing discourse had everything, abuse, rape, pedophilia, weird opinions about the movie cuties, faux psychoanalizing, grooming, nazi apologia, people crying, people very much not crying when they probably should have, sexting, homoerotic obsession, manifestos, fanart.

it was the worst and i loved every second of it

[a-court-of-moonlight-and-ire]

One of the things that kinda annoys me about acotar is that its a series about monarchs in a vaguely medieval european/pseudo-victorian setting and theres like, not even a mention of incest. Dont get me wrong, Im not one of those people who needs "historical accuracy" in their fantasy stories to be immersed because what does that even mean when we're talking about fantasy which is completely made up but idk, i guess its because acomaf (and even the UTM section of acotar) seems to be going more for gritty "historical accuracy" with all the women being brutalized and objectified all the time, so its weird that sjm would write that and then not even mention the fact that incest would probably be very normal, especially considering the fact that Prythian is prezty small and your "dating pool" would be pretty limited, even more so when youre royalty only looking to be with other royalty. Then again, considering crescent city (which is very modern) also has a bunch of unpleasant in-universe misogyny, maybe its not actually there for "historical accuracy" and sjm just really likes to write about misogyny for some reason. Also, apeaking of crescent city, if i remember correctly there was a whole thing in cc2 where Bryce is engaged to her cousin by the autumn king for political reasons and because the fae are clearly kinda archaic in the sense that they still have this outdated monarchy system, but then its like, okay how come the fae living in the modern day have arranged marriages to their cousins but the fae actually living in the equivalent of the 1800s dont?

I was thinking about this because I was thinking about Mor and how when she introduced herself as Rhys' cousin he was like "oh, we're only cousins in the most distant sense" and that was really weird to me, because I feel like if you were close you would be fine with just identifying as cousins even if youre technically cousins sixth removed or whatever. Like, maybe Im the one whos being weird about this, but does that not seem like the kind of thing an author would write because two of her characters who are related were romantically involved at some point and shes trying to lessen the incest of it all?

And the more I think about it the more im like, yeah, why did Keir wanna marry his daughter off to an entirely different court in order to gain power when he was already connected to the highlords main family of his own court and couldve gained even more power within that court by marrying Mor off the heir to the throne

[renegadessys]

Please info dump about Radiant Sun, I don't know what this is but it sounds fascinating and we're overdue for a new obsession

OK SO. FIRST OF ALL IM SO SORRY ITS NOT REAL. YOU CANT WATCH IT. :(((( It's a dnd campaign we played with our wife. SOMEDAY we might make it a show. Depending on how things go. BUT.

The Radiant Sun is the name of a D&D party in a home game we did. It consists of 6 people (as well as 40+ npcs) who are all batshit insane.

PARTY MEMBERS:

- Razor. The "main character" if a DnD campaign has one. Tiefling sorcerer who finds out later that he is secretly a member of the royal family and has special magic powers. MORE ON THAT LATER.

- Verona. Razor's bf who grew up as a captive in the same thieves' guild he was a captive in. They were friends since they were kids. She activated her own sorcerer magic (Divine Soul) and healed him when he got fucked up and tortured. She dies at one point early in the game and it is a catalyst for some Character Growth.

- Alixa. Batshit crazy 15yr old drow who was a custom homebrew class (knife artist, think rogue aesthetic but the whole point is doing cool shit w daggers). One of the central Problems in the world the campaign is set in is that there is a massive attempt by high elves to colonize the Underdark. She is the only survivor of her family who was killed/driven out. THIS WAR IS IMPORTANT BUT NOT FOR THE REASONS YOU THINK. Also she gets a giant pet lizard that can breathe fire. His name is Sparky.

- Avaciel. Former high elf noble who was cast out of her home city after it was taken over by Drow that wanted to find footing in noble cities to make the monarchy pay for the war/colonization effort. Became a bard who plays the violin like a badass.

- Shade. Shade is a demigod of The Shadow, one of the dark six in some dnd related pantheon that I don't remember the name of. She was created by that asshole as a failsafe measure in case her "dad" was ever slain by other gods, he set up his soul and powers to transfer into her body and planned to possess her and use her for his own purposes. She meets a demigod of another one of the dark six and eventually finds out that NEITHER of them are actually the kids of their "parents" they're actually kids of a DIFFERENT god and they're twins <3

- Aiyise. Personality and backstory wise a Straight Rip from another campaign we did but we wanted to fuck around with her so we gave her some totally different plot stuff and made her a cleric instead of a divine soul sorcerer. From a noble family who she believes to be great people until she gets un-modify-memory'd and finds out that they were actually horrible to her for her whole life and before she went out to adventure they wiped her brain. She is the tankiest motherfucker EVER. She's also the most uwu soft girl you will Ever meet.

PLOT STUFF.

Originally the party is called together by the Chamberlain of House Satra. House Satra is the ruling family over the continent the story takes place in. One of their daughters, Kyria, has gone missing! Oh No!! Party is told that several groups of adventurers have gone to find her and have all gone missing. They're a last ditch effort.

Notably. These kids are like 17 at oldest. Except for Shade who is weird and Avaciel who is like 23.

They do it anyway bc they are BROKE AS FUCK!!!!! And are promised lots of shiny money. And thus their adventures begin. They find Kyria, adopt her into the party, meet her "dad" (the "king" who is actually super super trans), are rewarded, and then are asked by the queen to go investigate a city that her brother is being held in for crimes she knows he didn't commit. Political bullshit. Whatever. These kids are incredibly hyped bc since all the official adventurers super died they have been appointed the Interim Defenders Of Toris TM. They feel all special. So they go.

While they are on the way, they are attacked by a Solar, a high angel of the Shadow who has been sent to retrieve Shade. Shade is not there when this happens so naturally the party, who have all known each other for like A Week, tell the solar that she's not there and they won't tell him where she is. So he tries to kill them all! And ends up killing Verona. Which makes Razor, understandably bc she is his not-quite-gf-but-hes-in-love-with-her, BIG MAD. They kill this asshole (Alixa is doing some insane called-shot/homebrew rules bullshit) and find out that these angels (because they are CR TWENTY ONE. AND RHE PARTY IS LEVEL FOUR.) are super powerful and drop super rare items. Including resurrection materials! So they continue their quest to their destination knowing that it's a big city and clerics can maybe help.

Other stuff happens in the interim BUT!

While they are in Faultline (the city) they find out Lots Of Insane Shit. Most notably, they find out that these things called the Draconic Eternals, basically giant ancient dragons that were sealed in a demiplane thousands of years ago, are still alive and trying to break out!!! They find out that there's a guy in the city who framed the queen's brother for killing a revolutionary who was actually his girlfriend so that he could get power over the city. The party subsequently kicks his ass and leaves the power in the hands of the revolutionary (who is not dead!!!) and her sister. Mostly her sister tho. Bc the revolutionary is busy kissing her fiance.

They go back and there's a big dance thing and Verona and Razor and Kyria see the "king" sneaking off somewhere with the chamberlain and decide to investigate. They follow them to a secret chamber and have the most insane series of stealth check rolls EVER and find out that. Uh. The king is working with the dragons. And killed his son, the prince, in order to help them break out. Because his son, you see, has this thing called the Soulscar. It's basically raw magic but super upgraded and powerful. And the only other person alive in the family line with the soulscar is mia and presumed never to return, and the soulscar is the only thing that could keep the dragons from coming back, sooooo they kill the kid! Kyria, notably, is Fucked Up about this bc that was Her Twin Brother.

You see where this is going from my character descriptions.

ANYWAY. After that horrible revelation they go back downstairs only to find that the oldest child of the royal family accidentally got Wish spelled into being like 16 and it can't be undone so she can't really be elected the next replacement for the king like the whole country was planning to do bc. Yknow. War Effort. And ALSO Avaciel's city's destroyer family is here. Or at least their son who she was supposed to marry is. And they are both super upset abt it!!! Because he's the only reason she's alive!!!! So Why Is He Here!!!!!!!

Their next quest is to go reclaim Avaciel's home city. Which they do. And then they go back to the main city.

And they play a game. With all their collected npc friends. Kind of like an icebreaker game. It's a staple of our campaigns tbh.

In that game, one of Razor's friends/the guy who watched over him and Verona at the thieves' guild, Hawke (who is also super a trans woman), is invited to play. And through a series of increasingly convoluted questions and a use of the Divination spell cast by Aiyise in order to find out what happened to Kyria's brother that was supposed to have died..... The Truth Comes Out. Razor is that kid. He was not killed. The king and his brother, the other person with the soulscar, created a plan that faked his death and saved his life but made him unfindable and hid him somewhere no one would ever look. And Hawke!!!! Is that "brother"!!!! And worked at the thieves' guild the whole time to take care of him!!!!!! AAAGHGHGH. Our entire party went INSANE when this was happening. It was crazy. So much shit made sense after that.

So Razor, now knowing everything, is taken to properly meet his family. He meets his actual parents in the context of being their kid. He finds out that they've saved presents for him for every birthday, memoirs, letters written to him etc in case he ever got to come home. Lots of tears etc.

And the "king" tells them about the dragon thing.

It turns out the draconic eternals have held blackmail over his head for like 3 decades. Just before the family's oldest kid was born they contacted him from their demiplane and said "if you do what we tell you we will wait until your family has died naturally before we descend upon your world and kill everybody. Otherwise we're doing it in like a decade lmao" and he, convinced he could find another solution with enough time, agreed to do what they said. And then they made him "kill" Razor (birth name Kyus) and he faked his son's death bc he couldn't make himself do it. He started the war at the dragons' bidding because he needed time to find a way to save the Entire World. And he didn't have that time without doing some genuinely horrible things. So he did them, and accepted that the world would hate him for it. Because he was protecting them from something much worse.

Then the "king" who I am now going to refer to as the queen bc she's trans and I feel bad decides that she is going to go against them. She can't do it anymore. So she arranges for a royal announcement to be made. She is gonna tell everyone about her son, about the dragons, about everything, and they will go from there.

Razor has known his family for like a day and a half btw. And he's about to be presented as a prince. And he doesn't want to go back to looking like he's "supposed" to. Which his family is fine with!!! But the kingdom maybe will not be. He doesn't do it anyway tho.

During that speech, the capital city is sieged by an assortment of "undesirable" races (orcs, drow, goblins, giants, etc) led by a tiefling who is so so so mad at the royal family and doesn't care what their excuse is. Uh oh! Razor recognizes him!! He knew him from the thieves' guild!

That's not important right now. What IS important is that he magically turns Razor's entire new family to stone and then drags them through a portal to God Knows Where. And Leaves.

And Razor jumps through after him. No time for the rest of the party to go.

He chases the guy with every ounce of his magic through an entire giant stronghold. And eventually he escapes. And Razor is So Mad.

He goes through an Arc Of Growth tm where he meets the giants' main god and is given a magical item that he will need to seal away the draconic eternals. There are 7 of those. The party already knows about one??? I think??? I deadass don't remember the timeframe on this. But they need to find all of them.

(Also at some point they find out one of the dragons didn't actually get sealed away bc he betrayed the other ones and he agrees to help them but that was an in between thing)

ANYWAY. Eventually Razor is reunited with the party and they go deal with All Of Those Guys' Bases. At one point in that whole thing Alixa finds out that she was chosen by one of the drow gods (NOT lolth) to be her champion and gets given a few bits of paladin magic as a treat. And also one of the important magic items!!!

They eventually stop all the guys and talk their leader down bc Razor and him used to be Buddies tm. And they get him to stop being Insane. And fix his family. And his family is back!!! But when they get back to the capital city they have to deal with the fact that the thieves' guild has taken over bc nobody was there to stop them. And Razor and Verona have TRAUMA tm around those guys. Esp Razor bc their leader tortured him because he knew something about Razor's magic (could see the soulscar via true sight) but Razor didn't know at the time so he just got beat up a bunch.

They fight them!! And win!!! Eventually!!!!!! And the city is (mostly) restored.

The party has a lot of stuff to do. At varying points, they are required to stop THREE separate apocalypses. An apocalypse based on the ancient elemental beings that a cult led by people including Aiyise's fucked up family are trying to resurrect almost happens but some of the party and friends (including Aiyise and her two besties from childhood) stop it. That arc includes a genius 15 year old basically inventing unsterilized open heart surgery on top of a mountain to save the kids of the crazy cleansing cult guys bc they had magical chips inserted into their hearts that had to be destroyed before they could kill the cultists. Necessity my beloved. <3

Eventually the Final Battle comes. The party fights its way through each Draconic Eternal in groups, boosted by the power of like 4 different gods. At the same time, 4/6 members of the Dark Six god group are trying to end the world in a different separate way than the dragons. So they have to fight 4 gods and like 12 fucked up evil dragons that are like ancient dragons dialed up to 15. But they have crazy magic items and are level 20 and have the blessing of, again, like 4 different gods. So they do it.

Holy shit. It's done. The Radiant Sun has just collectively stopped a triple apocalypse. Razor gets to be with his family, Verona gets to marry her bf, Avaciel goes home and rules over her city, Aiyise and her partners start patching up the damage done to their religion by training a new not crazy generation of clerics and paladins, Alixa gets to work as Eilistraee's champion, and Shade and her twin brother take over the roles of The Shadow and The Fury, their "parents" who aren't actually their parents. So they are gods now.

Everybody lives happily ever after.

For now...?

I'm sure there's a million other things to say abt them and I did NOT give the full details of every quest bc this was meant to be the overarching plot line so if you wanna hear anything abt specific people's personal arcs or anything I will answer all your questions ever. There is a chance that someday this post will be deleted off the internet because maybe this will be an Actual Animated Series someday and yknow. I dont want my whole plot online for everyone to see. But who knows!

Thank you so much for letting me infodump <3 ilysm

[dweebsmcbeebs]

BIG ASS OC REPOST!!

here are all of the digital refs of my ocs for a thing im calling Diablo Hill- I do need to redraw a lot of them but its the best i got

the main gang, Dustin, Ace, and Malcom, a bunch of queers who go around exploring haunted abandoned buildings and accidently summoning demons

Penny is a human side character, i haven't drawn enough of the side characters to justify a whole section- but Penny exists, she works with malcom and has a crush on every tall creepy guy she comes across

This is one of the most infamous local cryptids of Diablo Hill, some say he used to just a guy before something happened. He has eaten people but its not his fault he just gets hungry. he still broadcasts his rants ramblings as well as any music he likes, he often talks of "his love" "the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen" swooning and babbling endlessly of a woman he'd fallen in love with in life

This is The Pentacule, a group of strangely fully formed ghosts that can even leave their haunt, they rent their house out to some poor soul that they were going to eat- key word going to

Wyatt Weird is yet another suspicious character in Diablo Hill, he says to sell magic candy but its usually sub par warm melted goo, mostly because he keeps them in his coat. he restocks in a suspicious white van that seems to disappear behind back alleys- sometimes he rants and mumbles about a business partner who took everything from him

OK now The demons

This is Paprika Cheshire, the shopkeeper of the small hell town, he sells the goods of his fellow townsfolk to outsiders, he can often highten prices unfairly much to the dismay of the mayor- aside from his greed he is quite pleasant, just dont trust him with any secrets, his mouths like to gossip

This is Denora, she lives in the big city selling homemade trinkets, potions, and perfumes. she is always welcoming sometimes too welcoming especially for the city- her size usually protects her from danger but prevents her from really going out in the city given the cramped narrow and acidic streets

This is Squigg, they own the Jabberwocky Cafe, a small little cafe hidden away in the demon city that may or may not have ties to the mafia

This is Zig, the powerhouse of the (red team) mafia, a force of destruction and a wall of hot magma like skin, despite this hes very polite to his peers if not brutish and bombastic. His tie is a separate demon named Windsor, sometimes a voice of reason but usually a nagging presence that backs up his best friend.

Last but certainly not least we have Thorn a mysterious hulking beast of a demon, she has been spotted in the woods of Diablo hill, gathering roses and planting them around a cave that presumably leads directly to hell

in hell she lives on a tall mountain covered in twisted thorned foliage, she is mostly a recluse even but still considered part of the small hell town the mountain looks over, providing strong spiked logs for buildings and bright beautiful red roses as decorations

she longs for her lover on the surface

I have SO SOOOO many more but these are the solid in place roles and most deigns, i hope you like them because there will be more to come from my wacky silly demon world Love you Mwa!

[0dnznd0]

Okay so exactly about 2 years ago, i got an amazing idea for a comic book. I've literally spent the last 2 years of my life basically doing research, questioning people and everything, listening and reading all about the contents that will go into this comic since its based on real life historical events and they are pretty complicated.

and in 2020 while i was just starting research i came across "bandırma füze kulübü" (translation: Bandırma missle club).

Long story short: in 1959 this club was formed by Bandırma highschool kids to make missles, they first made a small missle on their own witht the resources they had at that time and the club expanded over time with new kids joining. Then they presented their missle projects to İstanbul Technical university then they presented their project to the Turkish military. Now its already hella impressive that bunch of Turkish highschoolers created a club related to such a cool idea but also expanded upon it to even reach the militarty but sadly for some unkown reasons, a fire basically destroyed all of the plans and the projects. The investigation is said to be nearly nonexistant to even begin with and the whole project was put to the shelves.

when i first came across this i was both sad to hear the way that everything ended and the way that it was handled.

like even in 2022 Turks are pretty far behind when it comes science stuff let alone space stuff, (due to reasons i cant talk about the reason why we buy missles from other countries instead of making our own, the reasons why are pretty politic and i dont want to get in trouble for saying anything. For legal reasons i am gonna mention that this post is about NO ONE but the bandırma missle club!!!!!!!!!!) like there was a whole weird ass situation with Turkey trying to buy s-400 missles from Russia and america then gettin on our asses about it since we are in nato (again for legal reasons i have to mention the fact i have nothing against both nations pls i swear to god) but like what if we MADE our OWN missles?? we are like the ball in a strategic football play, you know?? and thats why like this club was so interesting to me cuz for the last whole year all of the news were about these god damn s-400's like anyways im gettin too off topic here damn

I already had a bigger comic project idea so i had to put this comic idea to onhold due to that. But yeah i had the idea of writing about this club for a few years now.

today while i was stuck in a weird writers block for my main comic project i thought to myself "oh you know why dont i revisit this highschool missle club thing and write the script for a little comic about it maybe that will help my writers block" and i decide to do a re-research on them before hand as always and BAM-

i saw that there was a movie coming out about them this year????? you can imagine my shock LMAO

i have to say that in the trailer the visiuals, costumes, sets and set design already looks pretty good. The dialog and the editing of the trailer kind of gives me hope that this might be an actual good movie made by Turks. I'm a pretty harsh ciritique when it comes to Turkish cinema/Turkish entertaintment industry cuz like there is so much potential in it but its wasted most of the time. a lot of the things produced by the Turkish enetrtaintment industry are mid at BEST so thats kind of why. but this movie, you know might give me hope, i really hope it doesnt dissapoint man.

anyways i might not write the comic about this club im not sure. should I????? idk

[wanderrlust0]

…continued…

yeah thats what ive been dealing with for like a year now omg bc we first hung out last july and we basically hang out like every 5 MoNthS Lol okay not actually that long but like every 2 months about so yeah we dont even see each other that often?!? so lemme catch up with them and not have to worry about upsetting him and also thats why im even more anxious for when i tell him about the party thats a week after the concert bc it will be sooo soon like soooo soon considering our typical hang out gap and i wouldve brought my other friend but shes going to mexico!! so since they already came with me for her first party it technically does make sense to bring the same person with me and i also wouldnt be able to bring him bc he works every saturday but now hes in the middle of switching jobs so he actually might be free on saturdays soon and idk how soon but then what if he is actually free that saturday but i just decide to not go with him like will that make me an awful gf like idk but at the same time its a late party and ofc there will be drinks and he didnt drink last time when he met my friends for the first time but tbf it was a pretty quiet hangout so i cant rag him on that but say he comes like will he drink with me or be social or get bored or feel out of place. how long would he want to stay till he crashes or feels likes hes not having fun. he will be thinking about the like 20min drive back to his house and also the biggest biggest obstacle i think about is that he will know someone there already bc she was an old fling of his before he met me and she just happens to be my excoworkers gf;-; and she was there at the last party but i was blind, didnt notice, it was dark and i wasnt sober and its not like everyone who was there spoke and saw each other bc there were ofc a lot of diff cliques and we stayed near the same people but like people will walk by or youre chillin in the same area and its inevitable that theyll see each other so yeah thats honestly the main reason why i wouldnt wanna have him there which idk if thats selfish or bad of me bc its not like im scared something will happen ofc like i dont feel threatened by her or think that he’ll be into her now bc its been so long but like idk the thought of it feels weird to me esp since she already hit him up once after their friendship died out and she apologized and asked to get lunch w him and he politely declined and he told me about it after and thats how i know that they have history so its truly a small world where i live bc people got mutuals all over the place but yeah that concludes my insanely long thought and some background info between him and my friend) but i will tell him tomorrow about the concert (girl you better do istg) and tell him about the party a diff day

edit: i just told him and its 11:48pm omg. still made it before midnight

[dustteller]

Is it bad for a piece of media’s main story to focus on the oppressors in an oppressive/imperialist regime instead of the people victimised by said regime?

Hmmm I'm not sure I'm the best person to ask (because while im loud i also have no credentials), but I think my answer has to be no?

Ok, so, this is complicated because there's just several different aspects to this question. Overall, I do not think a narrative 'owes' its audience any form of abstract moral correctness. I think it's reductive and limiting to say that media MUST do this thing or NOT do this other thing because that gets in the way of good storytelling. A safe story is a boring one.

Additionally, I don't think focusing on the oppressors is inherently bad either. It's a neutral choice. I think there's a whole lot of great stories, many of which I love, that do this. This is my overall stance for most things in media, and it hold true for this topic as well.

Where I think things start to get dicey, however, is when the narrative props up the oppression itself as something positive. This is tricky, because if your main characters are the oppressors, then often the colonialist system they rule over being successful will often be a good development for them. I don't think this is bad either, because it's a character stake/goal/tool that can often serve the narrative. What I mean by proping up the oppression as something positive is when the piece of media starts to present it as something that should be desirable to the reader in real life, instead of simply something advantageous in the diegetic world of the novel.

The reason as to why this specifically is bad is because this usually reinforces white saviourism/manifest destiny/white man's burden-esque ideologies, or leans into some very racist stereotyping that actually harms people in real life. This is not like violence or problematic ships or weird porn or whatever that no reasonable person is doing in real life just because they enjoy reading fucked up shit in their spare time. This type of imperialist ideology propaganda is often far more insidious, and bleeds into real people's perceptions of the world. And if it bleeds into how people think of politics, or power, or people themselves, then it starts to reinforce existing prejudices, or even create new ones. And these prejudices then influence a person's actions, and suddenly you have a piece of media that acts as a funnel towards more extreme content if you're not careful.

Ironically enough, the best way to counteract this happening is to do away with the idea of a piece of media being bad because it does one thing or another. That leads to oversimplification, and if your mental framework doesn't leave space between the divide of Good Media and Bad Media, then you're not going to consume media critically past the initial classification. All media is bad in some aspect. You just have to learn to dissect media and examine what it's telling you, so you can make a conscious decision about whether it's right or wrong on a topic instead of uncritically absorbing the message. You're not going to agree with everything a story tells you, and that's ok. It's normal.

And finally, there's another issue when the oppressors being focused on becomes the norm. This is not really the fault of any independent piece of media, and is instead a marker of a social and systemic issue in real life, where narratives of colonialism almost never actually center the real life people that are colonized, not as authors, not as publishers, not as editors, marketers, reviewers, and certainly not as characters within the story. As such, there is a serious lack of diversity when it comes to narratives of empire, which leads to many of these genres tending towards abstraction when discussing the topic. After all, its very hard to create something with a main theme you've never experienced. In this case, its not just one person's fault, one bad actor that has spoilt the lot. Its bigger than that.

So no, I don't think a narrative centering an oppressor is inherently bad. I just think we need to make space for the oppressor to NOT be centered, and be critical of the media we consume so we don't inadvertently absorb something we don't want to become a part of ourselves. Imperialism and colonialism and oppression are much bigger than a single fantasy world, and quite frankly i don't think any of us are equipped to handle the full breath of the issue. It's about working together to dismantle the old and make space for the new.