#josh is mischief so many times

[rbbrbikerthorp]

Chavs No More

Liam and Josh, two 19 year old mates who were known around their neighbourhood for their cocky, rebellious attitude and distinct dress, found themselves wandering through an area of the city that had been neglected for too many years. As they walked and 'chatted shit' they spotted a disused warehouse with smashed windows and broken doors. It seemed like the perfect place to kill time, perhaps, indulge in a bit of mischief and check it our as a possible place to get together with their other mates for drinking and smoking.

Josh took a long drag from his cigarette, exhaling a cloud of smoke into the crisp air. The two life-long friends approached the rundown warehouse, its windows broken and doors creaking ominously on their hinges.

"Oi, Liam, reckon we can get in there?" Josh asked, nodding towards the entrance.

Liam smirked, "Easy. Watch and learn."

With a swift movement, Liam produced a crowbar from his bag, expertly jimmying the lock on the door. The two scallies slipped through the doorway into the building; their footsteps echoing in the emptiness of a very large space. The expanse of the space they found themselves in suggested the building's original purpose was a factory, although neither had a sense of what was once produced there. Josh lit up another cigarette, while Liam explored the desolate space hoping, perhaps, that he would happen upon something of value.

Josh stamped out his cigarette as Liam returned empty-handed.

"Liam, let's see if ther is like owt worth stealin'. look ova ther", Josh said pointing towards a set of double doors on the far side of the building.

The two friends began to wander across the former factory floor eventually reaching the double doors. Josh was about to push on the doors, but something was niggling Liam. He was unsure about going any further; grabbing Josh's arm.

"Did ya hear that?" Liam asked, looking around.

"Na, it's nothin'. Old buildings mack noises - c'mon"

That would be the last time that either of the two chavs would subconsciously assess the risks they may possibly face going further into the building.

Josh pushed on one of the doors. The squeaking noise made by the door opening suggested no one had used them in a long, long time.

The doorway opened up to a long corridor. Light emanated through opaque glass windows, many cracked and broken on one side of the corridor. On the other side there were rooms, which has clearly been used as in the past as offices. Most were just empty shells; the fixtures and fittings having been removed long ago.

As the two lads continued walking down the corridor they were so preoccupied by the thoughts of finding something valuable they could purloin that they didn't notice two wheelchairs left to one side. If they had been more observant they might have wondered why there were relatively new wheelchairs in an abandoned factory.

Liam and Josh carried on walking, passing more empty rooms and another wheelchair. Eventually they came to the end of the corridor where there was one, solid door. Unlike the others they'd passed by this door was padlocked. It also looked as though it had been recently fitted. The two older teens were eager to make their exploration of the derelict building worthwhile financially, so there was no way they wouldn't try break through the door.

Liam raised an eyebrow at Josh, who grinned in agreement. The crowbar made quick work of the padlock, and the door swung open, revealing a surprisingly bright, modern room filled with computer equipment. The room appeared unoccupied, but in the background was the sound of technology. All the screens were active; filled with row upon row of green text. There were two huge screens on one of the walls.

Josh was looking around the room; figuring out what they could easily pilfer and get the most money for. What caught Liam's attention was the dozen or so circular platforms in the middle of the room.

Josh tapped Liam's shoulder, "Look at these bruv," he said pointing to the middle of the room. Liam turned around looked to where Josh was pointing.

"What the..." Liam didn't finish the sentence before Josh interrupted.

"What the f*** is this like place?"

"You tell me bruv."

Intrigued by the peculiar sight, Liam and Josh couldn't resist walking over to the platforms, their chav bravado overcoming any sense of fear. The two chavs stood on the platforms, smirking at one another.

Until now they'd not noticed the body-sized, circular perspex tubes retracted above their heads. Just then they heard a motor start up above their heads.

Looking up, "look out," Liam shouted, but it was too late.

In a split second, the tubes above their heads dropped to the floor, enclosing the two scallies inside. Panic set in as they screamed for help, finally realising the gravity of their situation.

Josh and Liam's screams echoed through the room as the perspex tubes trapped the chavs on the platforms below. A weird mist began to seep into the tubes, swirling around the panicking duo. Initially resistant, the mist began to work its magic.

Josh and Liam's screams softened to muffled protests, and eventually, their once defiant voices fell into an eerie silence. The spine-chilling mist continued its work, transforming the rowdy chav friends into docile and compliant figures. As the eerie mist continued to swirl around the tubes, their eyes glazed over. After a few minutes the two chavs fell unconscious, succumbing to the mysterious effects of the mist - their fate unknown to them.,

Once it was confirmed that Josh and Liam were knocked out, the tubes retracted into the ceiling, leaving the room eerily quiet. Just as the last traces of the mist dissipated, the door creaked open, revealing two imposing figures in their early thirties. Tough and athletic, they entered the room pushing empty wheelchairs. The same ones that Josh and Liam had ignored as they walked along the the corridor not long ago.

Without a word, the mysterious pair approached Josh first, effortlessly lifting his limp form and placing him into the first wheelchair. The same process followed for Liam, their actions efficient and practiced. The once unruly chavs now sat, unconscious and passive, in the wheelchairs.

The two males wheeled Josh and Liam into an adjacent room, where a dim light revealed an array of sophisticated equipment. They positioned the wheelchairs in a calculated manner, whilst the transformative effects of the mist maintained its hold on their bodies and minds.

Whilst two chavs were unconscious, one of the males retrieved a pair of clippers. To finalise the process the two friends would go through they needed their heads shaving, and this was to be done before they came round.

Minutes passed, and gradually, the chavs began to stir. Their eyes blinked open, confusion replacing the previous chaos. Yet, as Josh and Liam looked around, their mannerisms had been already changed irrevocably. The aggressiveness and defiance that once defined them had been replaced with a newfound obedience and compliance.

Josh and Liam sat in their wheelchairs, their once-rebellious spirits now subdued. They looked at each other and then took-in their surroundings. The room was sterile, and the hum of fluorescent lights overhead added an eerie ambiance to the atmosphere. The two chavs awaited their fate.

Two shaved-headed males in green scrubs entered the room. They walked over to where Josh and Liam were sitting in the wheelchairs. They released the wheel brakes and pushed the two lads towards a pair of hospital beds. Without a word, they efficiently transferred Josh and Liam onto the beds and gently made them lay back. The once-rebellious duo stared blankly ahead, their eyes devoid of the spark that once characterised them.

The mysterious figures produced a pair of helmets from a nearby table. The helmets had curved face covering visors and were equipped with an array of wires and sensors. The men is scrubs carefully placed the helmets over the heads of the two chavs.

Left alone in the room, Josh and Liam lay motionless as the helmets began their work. Unseen forces rewrote their minds, further erasing traces of defiance and moulding them into compliant, obedient beings. The room remained silent, save for the faint hum of the equipment that orchestrated the transformation.

Once the process was complete, the two shaved-headed males returned to the room. The chavs' minds were now blank slates, ready for the next phase of their transformation.

They replaced the iconic chav tracksuits with sleek black skinsuits. The transformation was both symbolic and practical, signalling the departure from their previous identities. The once distinctive and brash street-wear was replaced with a uniformity that mirrored their new, compliant state.

With the skinsuits in place, the helmets were refitted once more, this time for further programming.

The room buzzed with unseen energy as the final touches were applied. The chavs' once-chaotic personalities were long gone. All that remained were compliant shells, devoid of all human emotion; ready to embrace a new purpose.

In a room filled with monitors, the shaved-headed males observed their work with a satisfied nod. They watched Josh and Liam laid on hospital beds, their minds blank and their bodies clad in black skinsuits.

The door opened and two technicians entered the observation room. It was time. The moment had come to usher the former chavs into the next phase of their transformation.

The compliant duo was wheeled into an adjacent room, where a series of machines resembling MRI scanners awaited them. However, these were not ordinary medical devices. Instead, they were machines designed to augment the human body, turning ordinary individuals into hybrid human-cyborgs.

The technicians meticulously positioned Josh and Liam in front of the metallic chambers, securing them in place. Over a three hour period, the two young males would go through a series of transformations, the first of which would prepare their bodies for the synthetic augmentations to come.

The low hum of the machines echoed through the room as the transformation began. The beds were pulled backwards into the MRI-like machines.

Once inside the first stage of the process began. Metal plates descended from the tubes, fitting onto various parts of the chavs' bodies with precision. Once this was complete, circuitry was added connecting the various metal plates. What couldn't be seen to the casual observer was that under the metal plating, a synthetic bonding was taking place. A bonding that permeated through the skinsuit and into the human flesh.

One by one, an artificial, mechanical limb replaced one of their natural ones. The flesh coloured arms and legs were now adorned with sleek, metallic enhancements, making them stronger and more resilient. The technicians worked with practiced efficiency, their gloved hands expertly activating the cybernetic upgrades.

Next came the ocular implants. The machines were programmed to approach installation of the eye replacements with precision. An implement descended from inside the machine, carefully removing one human eye from each chav and replacing it with the advanced technology. The blue glow emanating from the ocular implants signalled the integration of their new cybernetic enhancements.

As the machines continued their work, the once-defiant chavs had now been transformed into hybrid human-cyborgs, their bodies now a fusion of the biological and the synthetic. That said, other tha their heads, observers might struggle to find any visible evidence of the humans that were Josh and Liam - so much of their bodies now covered in metal.

The technicians stepped back, admiring their creation as the final adjustments were made.

The door to the room opened once more, revealing a figure cloaked in shadow – the former chavs' new master had arrived. With a wave of their hand, the technicians and shaved-headed figures in scrubs retreated, leaving Josh and Liam standing motionless, now fully augmented and awaiting the programming that would dictate their new purpose.

The master approached; a sinister figure with pale white flesh. dark veins and gas mask with eerie blue lenses that looked like it had absorbed into his face. The room hummed with anticipation as the final step of the transformation unfolded. The once-chavs, now hybrid human-cyborgs, were ready to serve their mysterious master. The machines had worked their magic, creating two obedient, formidable entities ready to carry out the bidding of their creator.

The enigmatic figure, shrouded in darkness, stepped forward and issued their first command to the newly transformed duo. "[Hiss] Josh, Liam, [Hiss] your first task is [Hiss] to bring others to me. You will bring [Hiss] your former friends to me. They, too, [Hiss] shall undergo the transformation [Hiss] and join your ranks as cyborgs [Hiss]."

Obediently, the two cyborgs nodded in unison, their blue ocular implants began glowing with a cold intensity. With a calculated efficiency, they left the room, their enhanced limbs moving with a precision that betrayed their former chav recklessness.

Before the cyborgs that were once Josh and Liam exited the disused factory, which was now serving a darker purpose, they donned a Nike Hoodie and skinny trackie pants - so they could blend in. The two friends roamed the streets, scanning the corners and alleys for their former comrades. Their new master's command echoed in their minds, drowning out any remnants of their past lives.

Finally, Josh and Liam located the group. The chavs, unaware of the transformation that awaited them, gathered in their usual haunt. The familiar faces turned to greet their once brethren. Expecting to see Josh and Liam, instead they saw the cold, unyielding gazes of the hybrid human-cyborgs.

[insanityclause]

Over the past 13 years, Tom Hiddleston has died more times than he can recall. “Let me think about this,” the actor tells us, pausing to count in his head. “I think, officially, there were two big ones.” 

He’s referring to his many exits from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the blockbuster franchise in which he’s played shape-shifting Norse god Loki Laufeyson since Kenneth Branagh’s 2011 film “Thor”—the son of Asgardians Odin (Anthony Hopkins) and Frigga (Rene Russo), and the half-sibling of Thor (Chris Hemsworth), the god of thunder. 

The character has since bounced between villain and reluctant antihero across five films, a handful of post-credits scenes, and Michael Waldron’s Disney+ spinoff series “Loki,” which Hiddleston also executive produces. The show wrapped its second—and supposedly final—season last November. The finale presents an end for the character, but not one of the aforementioned “big ones.” 

Hiddleston’s first “official” farewell came in Alan Taylor’s 2013 sequel “Thor: The Dark World,” which saw the god of mischief take a sword to the chest to save his beefy brother. “As written in the first script, it was a true sacrifice,” Hiddleston says. Unfortunately for Marvel’s long-term plans, the actor had done too good a job playing the trickster.

“When Marvel [executives] were testing the movie, they’d given [viewers] questionnaires that said, ‘Is there anything you didn’t understand?’ ” he remembers. “Literally every single audience member said, ‘Well, obviously, Loki’s not really dead.’ ” 

In classic comic-book fashion, the character did return, gallivanting alongside his brother in Taika Waititi’s 2017 follow-up “Thor: Ragnarok.” He died again one year later (“big one” number two) in the Russo brothers’  “Avengers: Infinity War.” There were no smokescreens or questionnaires this time; audiences watched as Loki’s neck was crushed by the purple fist of intergalactic warlord Thanos (Josh Brolin). 

Hiddleston remembers arriving in Atlanta to shoot his final scene and immediately bumping into Brolin. “He came up to me, gave me this huge hug, and said, ‘I’m so sorry, man.’ ” 

He meant it, too; everyone meant it. The sun, it seemed, had actually set on Hiddleston’s MCU journey. “At the end of that scene, I got a big round of applause, and everybody was so sweet and kind and gracious,” he says. “I got notes and emails saying, ‘Tom, you’ve done so much for us—what a journey. Come and see us anytime.’ I really thought that was the end.” 

And it was, for real, right up until it wasn’t—when the time-traveling shenanigans of 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame” blasted a younger version of Loki out of the established canon and into his own series. Over two seasons, the multiversal storyline envisions the title character as a figure who exists outside time and space. Across all there is, was, and may come to pass, there will always be a Loki, in some form, wreaking havoc. 

Hiddleston has long since accepted what this means for him as an actor. Maybe “Loki” Season 2 really was his last time in the role; or maybe he’ll play him until the sun burns out. “I’ve realized that, in human consciousness, that’s who Loki is,” he says. “Loki is this ancient, mythic character, who, in our collective mythology, represents the trickster, the transgressor, the boundary-crosser, the shape-shifter—somebody who’s mercurial and spontaneous and unpredictable who will always confound your expectations and wriggle out from underneath your certainties and convictions. Someone who we need and [who] is necessary.”

Hiddleston pauses, getting emotional. “Maybe Loki escaping death a couple of times is sort of an emblem of who he is in our culture,” he says, grinning at his own gusto. The actor has a habit of being self-deprecating about the depth of the character’s lore. “I spend a lot of time thinking about Loki. You can probably tell.”

You can tell, and it’s incredibly endearing. Talking to Hiddleston about Loki feels like discussing Shakespeare’s Richard III with Laurence Olivier or Tennessee Williams’ Blanche DuBois with Jessica Lange. They were actors who put their definitive stamps on those roles by returning to the well and constantly digging deeper. 

In conversation, Hiddleston is equally as likely to reference comic-book arcs as he is the ancient, anonymous Old Norse scribes of the “Poetic Edda” or Richard Wagner’s epic four-cycle opera “Der Ring des Nibelungen.” He speaks reverently of actors who embodied the trickster god before him, like Jim Carrey in Chuck Russell’s 1994 comedy “The Mask” and Alan Cumming in Lawrence Guterman’s 2005 sequel, “Son of the Mask.” He also heaps praise on those who played the part after him, such as his “Loki” costars Sophia Di Martino, Richard E. Grant, Deobia Oparei, and—in one very surreal Season 1 moment—“some alligator they found somewhere.” He cites legendary Marvel creators Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Walter Simonson alongside the likes of English essayist Walter Pater and Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, who once wrote of life as a “splendid torch” to keep burning for those who follow.

“Loki is ‘a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment,’ ” Hiddleston quotes, “and I want to make it burn as brightly as I can before passing it on to future generations.” 

This level of study started before he even landed the role. He recalls the 24 hours leading up to his “Thor” audition, when he was 28 years old. After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 2005, he quickly earned small-screen and stage acclaim—but he hadn’t yet achieved a major breakthrough. When he received the script for “Thor,” it felt familiar. “I remember thinking, This is almost Shakespearean, this language,” Hiddleston says. “What’s the best example I can [look to] of an actor who managed to humanize and make real this elevated world of myth?” 

He found the answer in Christopher Reeve, who played the title role in Richard Donner’s 1978 blockbuster “Superman.” “He’s masterful in that film,” Hiddleston says. “In a way, it’s a similar premise: He’s a god or he’s a being from a different realm, and it’s not naturalistic in the way that we might expect. He does it so truthfully, and it’s so clear and clean and open and honest. I thought, If I can even approximate or get close to the kind of clarity that Christopher Reeve had in those films, I’ll be lucky.” 

And then, the morning of his “Thor” audition, Hiddleston went for a run, “which is my habit before doing anything unusual,” he explains. 

Running has remained a constant throughout the actor’s MCU tenure. At any given moment over the last decade, the god of mischief was likely doing laps around Marvel’s go-to shooting location, Pinewood Studios (now Trilith Studios) in Atlanta. “Life is movement; I really believe that,” Hiddleston says. 

“I find when I’m running or walking, the repetitive nature of it relaxes the mind and allows ideas and inspiration to come from a deeper place. I see my work as an actor—especially in preparation for a project or a scene—as almost preparing myself to be open and ready to receive ideas, to receive energy from other actors, to receive energy from my imagination.”

Hiddleston found the technique particularly helpful when he was filming a scene for the “Loki” series premiere that he calls “one of the most thrilling challenges I’ve ever had as an actor.” In it, Loki has been poached from the flow of time itself by the temporality-policing Time Variance Authority and forced to watch what is, essentially, a highlight reel of his entire MCU arc. It’s one of the most deeply existential moments you’ll ever find streaming alongside the likes of “Bluey” and the “Cars” movies. Here is a man watching the sum total of his life—his hopes, his dreams, his failures, his own death—play out in a 30-second clip that ends with the cold, clinical words: “End of file.”

“I just kept imagining: If you were afforded the opportunity or forced to watch your own death as a bystander, it would bring about an existential shock and crisis unlike any other,” Hiddleston explains. “It was a scene where I thought, I don’t have a reference for how to play this. I just have to allow shock, disgust, disgrace, shame, disbelief, acceptance, incredulity, and sorrow to exist in the center of me.” 

As an executive producer on the series, Hiddleston had a say as to which of Loki’s many misdeeds would play in the sequence. He chose clips like Frigga’s death in “Thor: The Dark World” and his father’s final words in “Thor: Ragnarok”—moments Hiddleston knew would most fill the character with regret. As production was preparing to shoot the scene, he asked first assistant director Richard Graves for a 20-minute warning.

 “I decided to jog around the stage and internalize as many of those memories of those people, those characters, those actors [as possible]—to try and find the center of my own vulnerability,” Hiddleston says. “Part of the joy of it was just going back to basics, trying to simplify this very complex thing…. Go for a jog, get into your body, allow yourself to be open, and just be there; just feel it.”

One “Loki”-like time jump later, Hiddleston found himself in a similar situation as he was preparing to shoot his final moment of Season 2—a scene that effectively caps Loki’s 13-year arc. Across 12 episodes, the show guided its title character toward a truly heroic end: With all of existence on the verge of collapse, he steps out of time to tie the strands of every reality together. As the credits roll, Loki sits at the center of time, holding in place all that is—alone. 

It’s a lot for any actor to internalize, especially one who’s performing solo in front of a blue screen. With 45 minutes to cameras rolling, episode co-director Aaron Moorhead made a suggestion. “He said to me, ‘Why don’t you go back, if you can bear it, and watch some of your work [over] the last 15 years?’ ” Hiddleston remembers. “ ‘Take it in, see what it means to you, and then carry it when you step out onto the stage.’ ” 

The actor took Moorhead’s advice to heart. And suddenly, without meaning to, he was mirroring the moment that started the series: absorbing the sum total of Loki’s MCU run. But this time, his regret had been replaced with gratitude. Hiddleston watched clips from “Thor,” remembering a time when he and Hemsworth had yet to ascend to the A-list. He recalled working with powerhouses like Hopkins and Russo, and the bonds he forged with the “original six Avengers” in 2011. He thought about how fun it was to film “Thor: Ragnarok” with Tessa Thompson and Jeff Goldblum, and of the more recent friendships he found with his “Loki” castmates Di Martino and Owen Wilson. 

“I thought, What Loki is doing, he is doing for his friends. And so, Tom, why don’t you do it for your friends?” Hiddleston says. “That’s where the two of us met in that moment. And then I was so grateful I had this most amazing crew, and we did it together.”

The actor is, of course, noncommittal as to whether this is actually the end of his MCU run. The franchise is scheduled out until at least 2027, and Hemsworth has mentioned his desire to make another “Thor” film. And if Loki’s past has proven anything, even the most official endings can be undone. 

Either way, it seems to Hiddleston that something significant has ended, even if it’s just Loki’s full-circle arc. “I hope it feels redemptive because his broken soul is partially healed; and you see that this character, who is capable of love, has made a decision from and for love,” he says. The actor cites the “beautiful prologue” of the first “Thor” film, in which Hopkins’ Odin tells his two sons: “Only one of you can ascend to the throne, but both of you were born to be kings.”

“At the end of Season 2, Loki is sitting on a kind of throne; but it’s not arrived in the shape he expected, and there’s no glory in it,” Hiddleston explains. “There’s a kind of burden, and he’s alone. He’s doing it for his friends, but he has to stay there without them. There’s a poetic melancholy there which I found very moving.”

For now, Hiddleston “can’t even conceive” of his life without Loki. He only hopes that he’s lived up to his guiding ethos as an actor, which he sums up with a plea from E.M. Forster’s 1910 novel “Howards End”: “Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height.”

“The feedback loop for actors is that we get to inhabit a fiction,” Hiddleston says. “But hopefully, that fiction bears the shape of a truth that we recognize about life—that what we do reflects the ups and downs, the peaks and troughs, and the breadth and profundity of all of our lives.”

Hiddleston exists in that space between fiction and reality, the work and the resulting art, the prose and the passion. Long after we’ve moved on from our interview and started casually discussing the cherry blossoms blooming in New York, his eyes light up. He’s made another connection, remembered one more thing—just one last thing he’d like to impart about Loki. 

He spends a lot of time thinking about Loki. You can probably tell.

“I’m so aware that the reason I’ve been able to play him for so long is because of the audience’s curiosity and passion,” Hiddleston says. “I’ve been delighted to find that for a character of such stature, he’s remarkably human. Many of the characteristics that people connect to in Loki are deeply human feelings. That’s been the pleasure, is infusing this elevated character with humanity.”

Even then, honestly, it feels as if Hiddleston, like Loki, could go on forever. Unfortunately, outside of the MCU, time moves in only one direction. Once again, he has to run.

This story originally appeared in the June 6 issue of Backstage Magazine. Subscribe to In the Envelope: The Actor's Podcast to hear our full conversation with Hiddleston (out 6/6). 

[huhustuff]

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𝐒𝐢𝐦𝐨𝐧 𝐌𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐢𝐜 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐬___𝟖𝐭𝐡𝐒𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

🍂🧸💫

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Simon remembers his first-ever interactions with you. It was just a usual GTA game with his friends, but this time you were added as well. He did not think much of you at first and just enjoyed your comebacks when the other guys were tryna give you shit for being bad at the game.

The friendship between the two of you has always been mostly chill. When you both started living in the same house it took him a bit to get used to you, but that was inevitable and would be easily conquered with time. 

One of Simon’s favorite things to do with you is to jokingly go after someone else with you. It is known that he is a bit evil. But when it comes to you most people remember your kindness rather than the same mischief you possess as well.

When the both of you start tearing at someone with those goddamn smart remarks there is no escape or a way of defense for the victim. There is always a shock in the person's eyes when you join Simon cause even though you have done it so many times they still find it surprising. And Si finds it extremely amusing. 

The most often victim of the two of you would be JJ. There is a compilation on Youtube titled “Y/N and Simon gangbanging JJ for 16 minutes” that got too many views for that title alone. 

The playful beef between the two of you is nice too. The both of you know each other well enough to be aware of what topics are off-limits and know that the other will not bring them up. It is just pure fun, such a comforting simple joy to have in your life with your dear friend. 

It has also become a habit to gently annoy each other physically. So whilst Simon pinches your sides or tickles you, you flick the back of his head or rough up his hair a bit.

Little poking battles will occur even when you tell him that he should stop this kind of behavior since he is soooo old now. But Simon knows well you do not mean it and pokes you twice for calling him old.  

Simon was glad that you got along with Talia until you and her started teasing him together just like you and he did to others. He was betrayed and needed some time to recover /hj. 

He is very supportive of you. Encouraging your ideas and goals. Congratulating you on your milestones and accomplishments.

The two of you would sometimes go on late-night drives. They had no strong purpose, just to rest your minds from making content and editing. Every so often you would capture him in his driving glasses on camera knowing that it will drive the fangirls crazy.

You also helped him with being a good boyfriend sometimes. He was not doing badly on his own, but you would sometimes give small pieces of advice in aspects where he was a bit clueless. He just needed some assurance as well lol. 

So many cameos in each other’s vlogs. Mostly just fooling around or randomly jumping in the frame.

'Subscribe to Miniminter on youtube.'

'Don't, go leave a dislike instead'

'HEY!'

When you were younger you used him for his age. He got you energy drinks (no alcohol promotion on this blog) and one time he accompanied you to get a piercing which you were oh-so thankful for.

It was a condition that a parent had to be present, but you convinced the person that would do the piercing that any adult would do since you’re parents were far away. Josh and Tobi both said you were too young, but the third time was a charm and Simon agreed.

When they were getting it done Simon held your hand, but also laughed at you on the same time.

Dying his hair some kind of crazy color for a video, only for the color to not exactly fit him. (Atleast the color is even because you applied the dye instead of him-)

You have so many nice memories with the guy. Like the other brother/the brother you never had. 

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Hope you liked these headcanons and that you have a sunny day or night 🌤!!

[basiccortez]

Coming Home From Tour | The Baby Series

series masterlist | main masterlist

synopsis: The boys come home from tour :)

word count: 3.7k

warnings: babies, mentions of sickness, mostly fluff

note: surprise??? I've had this sitting in my drafts since the end of DiG and now that those pictures of Josh are floating around I thought 'heh why not'. This is terrifying, so lets see how it goes:)

JOSH: 

You knew that the moment Josh walked out the door, he was counting down the days until he could come home to you and Oliver. Josh was such a homebody before becoming a partner, now it was even worse. He always found it hard to leave home, spending months on the road, traveling around and playing show after show. He used to call Karen at least once a day, getting updates on things back in Michigan. Now, he was calling you at least twice a day, wanting updates, pictures and videos of his son. 

Oliver was now nine months old and sitting up by himself. You had sent the group chat a video the other day of him banging a toy tambourine on the ground and Josh had never felt so much pride in his life. As much as technology was a blessing, Josh still felt like he was missing out on so much. It was almost daily that Oliver seemed to change or have some new milestone checked off the list. The best thing Josh could do every night while on stage, a million miles away, was to make sure to sing for you and Oliver. And somehow, you both knew that Josh was singing for you. 

You were somewhat privy to what the boys were planning for their last show. Josh hadn’t given you too many details in your last facetime call, but you knew that they wanted to go out with a bang. You were fast asleep by the time they took the stage in California, after having put Oliver down and listened while you played a recording of Josh reading a bedtime story to him. You were doing your morning debrief, which consisted of scrolling through tiktok and twitter while feeding Oliver and drinking tea. 

“Oliver Kiszka, stop putting bananas in your hair,” You scolded the little boy, who just gave you a gummy smile and continued to smash bananas in his brown curls. He for sure had his father’s taste for mischief. You playfully rolled your eyes and placed a couple more pieces of bananas on his highchair tray, “It sounds like half your daddy’s fans are dead this morning. Can you believe that? Can you believe it!?” 

“Ah!” Oliver exclaimed and you laughed. 

“Yes, I know! Crazy man, I tell ya!” You kissed his cheek, “Let’s get you cleaned up, sticky boy,” You had put on a Jethro Tull album, which just so happened to be Oliver and Josh’s favorites. You believe it was more Josh’s favorite but Josh swore that Oliver told him it was his favorite too. You couldn’t help the giggle that arose from your throat as ‘Reasons for Waiting’ started playing. It always sent a delightful shiver down your body, remembering the first time you heard that song and the first time you and Oliver both saw Josh and the boys on stage. 

“What a sight for my eyes,” You sang softly as you wiped your son's cheeks with a damp rag, “To see you in sleep. . .” Oliver had the same big soft brown eyes as his father, and he watched your every move with such intent. You believed that the two were more similar than everyone thought. Everyday you watched Oliver grow, the more you saw the same personality as Josh. 

“Came a thousand miles-” You sang the last line of the verse, when another voice jumped in. 

“Just to catch you smiling.” 

You turned your head around, to see Josh standing in the doorway, his backpack on his shoulders and tired, soft brown eyes looking at you. Tears welled up in your eyes as you ran towards him, and threw your arms around his neck. He grunted as you crashed into him, but held you tightly, breathing in the scent of you. He felt his throat tighten up as he ran his hands soothingly down your back as you cried into his neck. This was the moment he had been waiting for for months. 

“Da!” Oliver’s voice broke them apart, and Josh’s smile beamed like a megawatt light. You stepped out of the way so he could go grab his son. 

“My sweet boy,” Josh held his hands out as the little boy reached for him. He undid the highchair tray and pulled him into his arms. You smiled as Josh placed kisses all over the little boy's face and Oliver giggled. Your two favorite sounds had become Josh’s voice and Oliver’s laughter. 

“My god, he’s gotten so big,” Josh shook his head, running his hand over Oliver’s soft hair. He pressed his lips to the little boy’s forehead, taking a sniff of his hair, “He still smells the same. Like baby powder and lavender. It’s addicting, I had to take one of his blank-” 

“So that’s where Hawky went! You had him!” You were going crazy thinking you left one of Oliver’s blankets at some venue across the country, but it was his father who had it the whole time. 

Josh just shrugged and went back to loving on his son, “I missed you. I missed you. I missed you. I never want to leave you again.” Josh walked to you, and put his free arm around you, pulling you into him. You placed a hand on his chest and looked up at him. Tears brimmed his brown eyes, and you gently cupped his cheek, brushing away a stray tear, “Ever. You’re both going to get so sick and tired of me, you’ll be calling Jake to haul me away.” 

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” You smiled and Josh pecked your lips.

JAKE: 

He knew it was absolutely insane, but Jake couldn’t wait the next day to fly home with his brothers. Don’t get it wrong, Jake absolutely loved what he did. He thanked Josh nearly every day for deciding to embark on this crazy journey with him. Without Josh, there would be no Greta Van Fleet. Jake’s dream would’ve been just that. . . a dream. He would’ve been just another crazy kid who had true talent that never went anywhere. But Jake’s second dream had come true nearly ten months ago, the dream of becoming a father. 

Dylan Rose Kiszka had been the greatest gift Jake had gotten since he got his first Gibson SG. He was terrified of becoming a father, and he still had his fear. But everyday it evaporated a little bit more seeing Dylan grow. It had torn him to pieces to have to leave her and go out on the road, but you assured him that she wouldn’t want him to stay here and not go share his talent with the world. Every place that they had been, Jake made sure to buy a postcard (or send someone to go get one) so that he could start a scrapbook for her to look back on. You and Dylan had gone to a couple shows, and made sure to get the concert poster and hang it up in her room with the rest of her posters. 

“Are you sure you still want to take this flight?” Ben, their tour manager asked as he dropped Jake off out front of the airport. 

“I can not spend another night away from them,” Jake said, grabbing his backpack. Josh was sitting in the back seat and grabbed his brother’s shoulder, “The parental scolding can come late-” 

“Give her a big kiss from us,” Josh smiled, “I miss my Dyl Pickle.” 

Jake smiled and nodded at his twin, “Thank you.” 

“Now go! Or I'm gonna kick your ass for making us drop you off at 1AM,” Josh pointed towards the door, and Jake quickly scrambled out of the car and ran towards the ticketing counter. 

He couldn’t remember the last time he took a redeye flight, probably when Sam and Danny were still in high school and they had to be back from playing a show to get to monday morning classes. Jake pulled his sweater on and sunglasses, hoping that he could get through this flight without being noticed. Which, luckily he did, and sat down in his seat near the window. It was bittersweet leaving the tour so soon. He would’ve loved to stay and celebrate the end of what felt like the longest tour in history, with his brothers. But he also wanted nothing more to get home to you and his daughter. 

— — — 

Nearly four hours later, Jake had landed back in Nashville. The earth was still and quiet as he got into the car waiting to take him home. His heart started racing and his hands grew clammy. Why was he so nervous? He wasn’t sure. Maybe it was the fact he’s spent the last five months of his daughter’s life on the road? Would she even know who he is? Yes, they had facetimed and called, and you even spent a week with them on the road, but that was different than this moment. 

He was home. The tour had come to an end. There was no more packing up to wake up in a new city or country. There would be lazy moments just the three of you in the morning while you tended to Dylan and Jake made his famous blueberry pancakes and eggs. There would be sessions at the studio where he would try and get Dylan to walk or maybe even bang some keys on the piano. There would be nights where he’d help get her to bed so that you can relax from spending the day with her.  

The driver pulled up in front of the small craftsman that you inhabited, and Jake thanked him, giving him a tip. He stood there for a moment in front of the house, just taking in the sight of it. It felt like it had been years since he had been there. He looked to his left, at the mailbox that you insisted on painting for your first house. Your hand print, his, and Dylan’s were on it, like the house in UP. A smile broke out on his face as he fished his keys out from his bag and unlocked the door quietly. 

Jake did his best to avoid the creaky parts of the floorboards as he made his way upstairs to the nursery. The mobile above the crib was going, softly playing the melody to ‘Light My Love’, which made Jake’s heart pound in his chest. He walked over to the crib, which he noticed had been lowered and made him a bit sad to think about his little girl growing up. Dylan’s light brown eyes were looking up at the mobile as Jake leaned over the crib. 

“Look at you, wide awake,” Jake smiled and reached in to pick her up. Dylan didn’t stir, as if she knew who Jake was. He grabbed her baby blanket from the rocking chair, and sat down, laying her head on his chest and rocking gently, “You remember me? Remember who I am?” Dylan looked up at him, her quiet way of saying that she did, in fact, know who was holding her. You had told Jake during the last phone call that Dylan had started to become clingy and tearful around people she didn’t know. 

“Kinda expected you to yell at me, or something,” Jake smiled, playing with the curls at the base of her neck, “But you know me, don’t you, baby,” He placed a soft kiss on the top of her head, and she laid her head back against his chest. She sucked gently on her thumb as Jake rubbed her back, “I missed you like the sun misses the moon at night. But there’s no more needing to miss each other. Cause I’m home. We’re all together again.” Jake settled in the chair, letting out a deep breath, as he kicked his feet up on the footstool in front of him. 

He slowly rocked, not only himself, but Dylan back to bed. And a couple hours later, you arose to find both people you loved fast asleep. You walked over to the rocking chair and gently ran your hand over Jake’s hair, kissing his forehead. 

“Welcome home, rockstar,” You whispered.

SAM: 

Raising twins was hard. Raising twins on your own was even harder. You had found a much deeper appreciation for the people of the world who raised babies on their own. You knew that your single parenting life was only lasting for a short period of time, but you were so ready for Sam to be home to help with Harrison and Lennon. The three of you had stayed home the whole tour, you were too anxious about flying with two newborns by yourself to wherever Sam was. Even though you knew that you would have help with the babies, you just weren’t ready to go through all that yet. 

It had been harder than you thought having Sam away. The first month was fairly easy, since the twins were only about three months old. They slept most of the time, and you had Karen around to help you. Then they started getting older and sleep regression had hit. Then on top of sleep regression, came teething. And on top of teething, came sudden weaning (which had hurt more than you were willing to admit). Now Harrison was standing with support and Lennon was crawling, both of them getting into everything. 

The boys had played their last show the other night, and Sam was due to come home today. He told you to not make a big deal out of it, but he should’ve known better than to tell you that. Because you, in fact, were going to make a big deal out of it. You and the twins had survived your first tour. You had gotten through six months of being alone with two Kiszka twins. 

You planned on cleaning the house, picking up all the stray toys that were strewn everywhere. Finishing up the mountain of laundry that you had been ignoring for days. You were going to have Harrison and Lennon make a banner that said ‘Welcome Home’ on it. And cooking Sam’s favorite, breakfast for dinner. But that was all thrown out the window when a cry woke you up at 3AM. 

“Shh, Harrison,” You tried soothing your ten month old. Somehow both the twins woke up sick. Lennon had thrown up all over the second you picked her up, and Harrison had hardly stopped crying since he woke up. This was the one test that you hadn’t gone through while Sam was on tour: the first flu. Lennon was crying in her pack-in-play, having pulled herself up to stand as you ran around the kitchen trying to make a bottle for her. 

“I know, I know,” You sighed, opening up cabinets and looking for the motrin, “You’re just so sad and. . .” You grimaced as you heard the sound of a hiccup followed by a splash, “Your tummy hurts. Mama’s getting you medicine.” You set Harrison down in his high chair, which was hard since he was clinging to your shirt for dear life, “One second baby, gotta help your sister.” 

You pulled away from your son, to grab the bottle and syringe of motrin. You measured out the correct dosage of the liquid, before grabbing the now heated bottle and going to Lennon. Avoiding the vomit that was now on the plastic mat of the pack-in-play, you picked her up and placed her on your hip. She squirmed her head around as you tried to give her the medicine. 

“C’mon, Lenny, it’ll make you feel better,” You tried convincing her. But if there was one thing about these Kiszka twins, it was that they were smart, “It tastes so yummy, see momma tries,” You putthe syringe on your lip, “Now baby tries!” Lennon shook her head and wailed even louder, if that was possible, “Lennon May, it’s good for you!” She shook her head around again, and you could feel the frustration starting to settle in. You took a deep breath, ready to try and give it to her again when a voice came in from behind you. 

“Oh is the baby sad?” Sam’s voice was like a breath of fresh air as you sighed and closed your eyes. You turned to face him, near tears as he walked to you. You handed him Lennon, and he gently squashed her, taking the syringe of motrin from you, “My dear, sweet, girl, you’re so sad. Why? Why is my baby sad?” 

“Both of them have a cold,” You said and went to pick up Harrison, “I’m sorry. This isn’t the welcome home you deserve. I had a plan with a clean house, balloons, and a cooked meal cause I know you’ve been eating nothing but-” 

“As much as all that sounds great,” Sam said, as he finished giving Lennon her medicine, and set the syringe back down, “I would think something is even more wrong if I came home to a clean house and dinner on the table.” 

“But you-” 

“But I, nothing,” Sam smiled and looked at you, “If I wanted nice and quiet I would’ve gone to my parents. I want loud and chaos. I want to spend the day with my twins, sick or healthy.” 

“But Sam, you-” 

“Get to cuddle my babies back to health? Why yes, I do,” Sam said, and kissed Lennon’s cheek. He walked over to you and placed a kiss on your lips, “This is the best welcome home I could ever have.” 

“I’m covered in baby puke and haven’t washed my hair in four days,” You pouted. 

“And you look so beautiful. What is a better welcome home than my girl, and my babies? Nothing,” Sam said, and grabbed your hand, “Now come on, I want cuddles and Bluey.”

You giggled and followed him into the living room. You sat down on the couch, each of you holding a twin in your arms, as you grabbed the remote and went to all the recorded episodes of Bluey. You found one that seemed to be the twins favorites and settled in next to your baby daddy, as he sang along to the intro song.

DANNY: 

Danny sighed as he walked into the house, quietly kicking off his shoes. It was late when they had gotten in and unloaded equipment from the bus. He had sent you a text not to wait up, that he would probably be home late. He didn’t want to come home after you and Jude went to bed, wanting to spend his first night home from a long tour with you and him. But, he also didn’t want you staying up late past Jude’s bedtime either. 

Jude was almost one, and Danny felt like he had missed most of his life already. There were milestones that Danny had missed due to being on the road, or being at the studio. He hated it. You had told him over and over again that it was okay, that Jude wouldn’t even know the difference if Danny was there or not. It still didn’t help Danny feel any better. 

The house looked pretty much the same as he had left it a couple weeks ago, but there were a few more toys laying around which was curtesy of Jude Francis. Danny picked up a couple of them, putting them in the basket by the fireplace where you kept them. He found a sticky note on the mantle that said you left him dinner in the microwave. 

“Always one step ahead,” Danny whispered, and picked up the note, making sure to place it with the others he kept from you. 

He moved around the kitchen quietly as he warmed up the plate of food you had left for him. He smiled at the new picture on the fridge that looked like Jude had drawn at daycare. The front of their fridge had become covered in pictures of Jude and them, pictures Jude had scribbled at daycare, or projects they had him do. Danny cherished every single picture like it was a masterpiece. While Danny was away, you made sure to facetime him as you put the new picture on the fridge and cheered for Jude as you did so. 

When Danny was done eating, he walked up the stairs quietly, looking at the various family pictures that littered the walls as he walked to the bedroom. He smiled at your sleeping frame as he moved around in the half lit room, taking off his clothes and putting on something more comfortable. He washed his face and brushed his teeth, throwing his hair up into a bun. He walked over to you, and gently ran his hand over your hair, and leaned down and placed a kiss on your cheek. 

You moved slightly at the feeling of his body, and gave him a sleepy smile, “Mm, welcome home, baby.” 

“Glad to be home, honey,” Danny whispered and leaned back down to kiss your lips, “How was your day?” 

“Good. Jude drew a new picture at daycare.” 

“I saw. Might need him to draw my new base drum cover.” 

You let out a tired chuckle, “You eat?” 

“Yeah,” Danny nodded, “Go back to sleep, I’m gonna go check on our boy,” You nodded and Danny kissed your lips once more  before he walked down the hallway to his little boy’s room. 

His heart felt warm as he walked into the room, and could see his son’s sleeping face, with his thumb tucked into his mouth. Jude was fast asleep on his back, small little sighs leaving his mouth as he slept. Danny crept over to his crib, leaning over it as he watched the little boy sleep soundly. Danny watched his chest rise and fall, still scared that he was going to have a lapse in breathing. Jude had finally grown out of his sleep apnea, but it didn’t stop Danny from still being worried about it. 

Danny sighed and leaned his head on his arms, closing them for a second when he heard Jude stir. Danny picked his head up quickly and watched as the little boy moved around, readjusting to get more comfortable, and shifting the soft blanket that covered him. Once Jude was settled back into sleep, a deep sigh leaving his mouth, Danny fixed the baby blanket, slightly tucking him back in. Danny gently patted the back of his head, feeling his soft brown curls, and then leaned in to kiss his head. 

“Goodnight, baby,” Danny said, and left the room, to go lay down next to his wife.

taglist: @seventieswhore @zoelle16 @wildmoonchild906 @m1rkw00dpr1ncess @canyonmirrors @ohitselliana @gretavanfleas @callmebymym @thatcatbsong @gvfvanfleet @bigberkinbagholdfive @caprisunsister @strugglingtodoshit @idk-maddie @Age_of_Kristin @brokenbells11 @kirbishifts @fatefellshortthistime @myfriendtheghost @mylifeisjustafeverdream @shutupdevvie

[g-xix]

How accurate are my Sidemen HC's?

A couple years ago I did "Duke of Edinburgh with the Sidemen" Headcanons... And DofE is like a long hike and camp overnight - quite like THIS VIDEO:

So, having watched that video n seeing what the Sidemen are like camping.... How accurate were these HC's I made, from a few years ago⁉️:

Josh: RESPONIBLE "DAD" LEADER -Helps everyone stay on track -First to trample the path through the nettles and brambles  -Goes ahead to hold nettles and thorns out of the way so everyone else can walk -Makes journeys to the back of the group to talk and motivate the person at the back of the group -Waves and says hello to all passerbys -Also apologises to passerbys for the others when the group gets too rowdy -Became leader by firstly being elected by teachers to be the "LEAD ROAD CROSSER"- and thus being made to line everyone up and look both ways before counting to three and all crossing the road together. After that, Josh became head of taking breaks, breaking apart arguments, and dealing punishments. Oh yes- whenever anyone became too rowdy, Josh dealt sanctions- whether that be five push-ups, fifteen sit-ups, or a sticky-weed slap. Ethan, at one point, tried to push Simon into the lake- which would've made Simon's entire kit wet, and have broken his camera. Thus, Josh sanctioned Ethan to bend over whilst all the boys made a circle around him and neck slapped him one by one for his transgression. 

Vikk: TRUSTY NAVIGATOR -Has a compass strung around his neck and map in hand at all times -Whilst the other boys lie in the grass and relax he's on his feet tracing the trail on the map with a finger, finding the route they'll travel during the next 30 minutes -Guided them down the wrong path and made them do an extra 2k one time. JJ showed Vik what everyone wanted to do with him. -Often walks with Josh towards the front or chases after Harry who's stolen the map -Great banter- always sets up his puns by beginning an innocuous conversation about the landscape or the weather before saying the most face-palm-ing dad-pun which makes everyone groan

Tobi: LEAD SNACK-MAN -Think you're running out of energy? Getting hopeless? Tobi'll have something in his pocket to make your day (  ;)   ) -Nobody knows how he managed to carry so many snacks on him -Somehow he always knows exactly what everyone needs  -Often pulls random people to the side and deals a sneaky sweet before saying shhh and returning to the group as if nothing happened -Somehow also never has his snacks melt or get crushed???? -Also 100% snapback merchant - no burning to be seen with Tobi's sunhat  -When he slept (in a tent with Josh) Harry and Ethan stole Tobi's rucksack at 3am and took it back to their tent, giggling like schoolgirls- ready to see whether they were right, and Tobi's rucksack was stuffed to the brim with snacks and nothing else. They ripped the zipper down and peered inside... but were surprised to find nothing but Tobi's toiletries bag, a can of Lynx deoderant, and 3 more snapbacks. Confused, they tip-toed back and inserted Tobi's rucksack back into his tent... Though they also saw a deflated, empty sleeping bag on the side of Josh. Shrugging, thinking it was nothing, they turned back to return to their tents... only to see Tobi shadowy figure stood directly behind them. The sheer shock of Tobi's presence scared Harry and Ethan and caused them to scream before sprinting back to their tent and diving into their sleeping bags, near to shitting themselves from fear...  before giggling once more as they saw Vikk stirring as one of the other tent boys (who had been confused and stepped out of their tent to see what the scream was) got a bollocking from their DofE coach for being awake at such hours. 

Harry: MISCHIEF MAN -Simply signed up for shits n gigs -Got distant cousins and relatives to forge all of his DofE documents as he said that he had volunteered by "Walking his elderly grandma's dog" (Their grandma lived next door and all Harry did was walk his dog afterschool). -Also pretended to have learnt parkour for his skill, and said he rollerbladed for his sports. His Uncle signed both of those off, saying if Harry could do a backflip by the end of the 3 months he would sign them. Harry almost broke his neck trying to do the backflip, but he did it in the end, and Uncle George did end up signing his forms -Steals the map from Vik just to get chased by Vik and see Vik have some fun -Harry has an unbelievable stamina and was able to walk the whole way, and chase butterflies, and throw his backpack down the hills before rolling down the big hills whilst all the boys walked.  -Tried to do a backflip at the campsite (which was shared with other schools) and took down another school's tent. Ethan and Harry ran away giggling whilst Vik just stared at them warily wondering what they'd done now -Harry knew Vik was navigating them the wrong way that entire time (when they ended up doing an extra 2k) but didn't tell anyone because he wanted to see the lake that the 2k route went by -Deffo just wore a pair of shorts got cut by the brambles and strung by the nettles, but didn't care. Came home with bruises and scratches along his legs and told his family he got chased and mauled by a horse, but won the battle in the end.

Simon: CAMERA CREW  -His dad made him take his camera so he could take nice pictures of the landscapes and things to show when he got back home -Took pics of the landscapes + all the boys together -Accidentally knocked the camera and switched all pictures to live pictures which turned out for the better, as the pictures displayed a short audio and video before the picture was taken -Every time Simon got the camera out to take a picture of a landscape, JJ would try to moon the camera by standing by a bush or in the grass and bending over, pulling down his bottoms too. -JJ got a big bug bite on his arse the next day, having pulled his bottoms down in so many fields. -In the night, Harry and Ethan also stole Simon's camera and recorded a video with whispers and giggles, as the duo threw things at Vik and sat on top of him without Vik so much as stirring.  -JJ filmed a few random clips of Simon sleeping with his own commentary before Harry and Ethan stole it

Ethan: MISCHIEF MAN #2 (+CHEF!) -Harry's doppleganger -Whenever someone got too sick of Harry, Ethan would double back on Harry's joke and laugh his iconic laugh that made everyone smile a bit, even if they were sick of Harry's antics -Had a sword fight with Harry using the tent poles needed to set up a tent. Vik just sat on a camper chair to the side and watched in "wow these dumbasses", only running when Harry began jabbing his tent-pole at Vik -At camp, everyone was exaughsted and just wanted to sleep, and Ethan made a great tomato pasta with some cheese on top which was really what everyone needed.  -Last to go into his tent at night and first to wake up, having made hot chocolate for everyone and spent his time packing the stove whilst everyone headed to brush their teeth and change -At first, Ethan wanted just Harry and himself in the tent "for the Behzy-bog vibes", but When everyone got into their pairs for tenting... Vik too focussed on mapping his route and subsequently didn't get a say. Therefore, Harry insisted Vik came into their tent despite Ethan's unsureness. Ethan thought Vik was just a book-smart, education lover. But during their hike, at the times when Harry got too energetic and ran off with JJ, and Ethan was too tired and lagged at the back... Vik would give his map to Josh and join Ethan at the back, making sure he was okay and offering some water and words of encouragement which were surprisingly necessary, Ethan found. And then, although Vik fell asleep quickly during the night, Ethan didn't mind as him and Harry still did all the devious things he thought they might. 

JJ: nobody knows why he's there -Literally hates the outdoors -Hasn't been on a 10k+ hike before -Asks whether they're there yet every kilometer -Drank all his water within the first two hours -Subsequently needed to stop the hike four times so he could take a piss in a bush -Started stealing other people's water bottles so he could drink for the rest of the walk -Got stung by a nettle and began screaming and rolling on the ground clutching his forearm. Josh carried his bag for the next few kilometers before Vik told JJ to suck it up and put it back on JJ -Vik (like everyone) ended up getting stupidly sick of JJ and had a rage moment, yelling at him to "FUCK OFF YOU INCOMPETENT FUCK" which was humbling... until the group walked into a rapeseed field. JJ broke off a shoot of the plant and began violently tickling Vik with it (as Vik sneezed whenever he inhaled too much rapeseed pollen... It was a very specific type of hay fever) until Vik was running across the field with JJ chasing after him giggling maniacally. When Josh reached the end of the field and found JJ laughing over Vik, crouched on the floor and covering his face, and became Vik's protector from JJ for the rest of the day. For the rest of the day, JJ instead (from a safe 2 meters away) threw sticky weed onto Vik's back and ended up covering his back with the foliage- so much so that when the group reached camp, they had to use a pocket knife to cut through the swathes of weed JJ had stuck to Vik's rucksack -Whilst Ethan, Harry and Vik went on plate washing duty, JJ stole a shovel from the camp and tried to dig a hole under the trio's tent. He made about a 10 inch deep and wide hole, which the trio found him digging once they returned. Vik was made to sleep on top of the hole, and woke up groaning from the back pain of the small hole, as well as the fact the entire tent had slept with their heads facing downhill and thus they all had incredible headrushes in the morning. 

[quitealotofsodapop]

In the Wukongverse what is Wukong's and Macaque's singing voice like?

Oh I do Love me some singing hcs. Took me a while cus I bad at actually remembering singers. I'm just trying to add as many song links as possible.

LMK: These two's english VAs (Sean Schemmel & Alejandro Saab) have sung before, and I will repeat my thoughts. Whilst Macaque is the more "stage friendly" of the two and can interact with an audience and put on a show, Wukong is stupidly good at singing. Like, LMK!Mac is dumbfounded how good his Wukong is. Wukong's stage fright gets to him tho, so his voice cracks the second he detects anyone listening to him - only Mac, the kids, and baby monkeys know his true voice. He destroys everyone at drunk karaoke tho.

HeroIsBack: SWK's singing voice is initally very harsh (not use much in 500 years) but grows softer/more confident as he sings. I can almost hear it as being like the song in the film itself "The Feeling of Flying", just full of joy. Also dubbing bonus; Jackie Chan singing the Cantonese version of "I'll Make A Man Out of You" from Mulan (1998). HeroIsBack!LEM's voice is similarly underused but a hidden gem. Mostly reserved for lulling infant monkeys to sleep. A tenor like Thomas Sanders. Gets embarassed quickly because his singing voice "doesn't match his face" (Dasheng disagrees).

Reborn: You could say his warped view of his own demonic identiy hasn't exactly left Reborn!SWK a positive idea of his singing ability. His actual singing voice is surprisingly deep with a lot of octave range; example Jonathan Young. 100% would jam with anime opening songs. Secretly gets really excited when he duets. Reborn!LEM is much less confident in their performing ability than the other LEMs, his voice is much softer, quieter, and soprano-pitch. Ethereal almost; like Ben Whishaw in The Tempest. And this LEM might just sing "Ariel's Song/Full Fathom Five" too - since his six ears often "hear "pick up" songs of the future. May use his voice to guide the lost souls he chariots.

Netflix: This SWK do be singing, and he penned his own theme song! Hidden talent at composing? I hc that he's singing voice is the metal version of his theme as done by Voodoo Kung Fu & Ian Honeyman. Probably scares the other monkeys (sans Reborn!SWK who starts rocking) the first time they let him take the mic and he goes full heavy metal on them. Has a hidden softer tune only his pilgrims + LEM know about. Netflix!LEM would say that they'd rather eat glass than sing in public, but like their main inspo (Aubrey Plaza - "Get Happy") they are ridiculously good at swing/jazz style music where the singer interacts with/insults their audience. A good example of them singing (whether for a con/trick) would be Amber Gray in Hadestown.

NewGods: This SWK sounds like a smooth cruise /lounge singer. This man can bust out a Sinatra that'll make the room shake. He however can get really emotionally into the music and end up crying at the oddest songs. Good reference would be Richard Cheese. NewGods!LEM gots broadway vocals like Josh Groban, and will completely shred you with his Phantom of the Opera performance. Unless he decides to use his voice for mischief and starts singing filthy blues songs with his SWK.

2000sCartoon: I bet these two dont really flex their singing muscles much so they dont sound "good", but SWK loves him some travelling songs and shanties, and his LEM provides good backing. SWK has a crackly, higher pitched singing voice like George Salazar (Be More Chill + Percy Jackson Musical). 2000sCartoon!LEM's voice I can see being smoother like Ashe (of "to ashes" on youtube), and once he becomes more confident in himself; its one of the first clear distinctions the two monkeys can make between one another.

Meihouwang: I could see Shihou & Mihou having "younger-sounding" singing voices similar to Zach Callison (of Steven Universe fame), and Jeremy Jordan (Tangled Series + Death Note Musical) respectively. Absurdly good for monkeys with no formal musical training.

Smash Legends: This Wukong has a pretty good singing voice but he uses it for goofy "meme" songs (ex Loney Island) since he's actually a little mic shy. Has potiential for greatness. "Serious" singing voice is similar to Sam Tsui. Smash!LEM aka SixEars is a legit indie music star along the lines of a "faceless" nearly-online-exclusive artist - best comparasion I can give for his "typical" vocal ranges (remember perfect mimicry/pitch) is between Aly & AJ to Taron Egerton. Will leave the other monkeys in the dust in a competition.

No matter who's the "better" singer of all of them one thing is for certain; you turn on that karaoke machine around the SWKs and LEMs, and there's about to be a whole lot of monkey business.

[satans-helper]

Touch Me & You'll Never Be Alone - Part I

No matter how much heartbreak the Kiszkas go through, there’s one person who is always there for them, who’s never going to leave.

Part I - Lights Down Low

Pairing: Danny Wagner x Josh Kiszka

Word Count: ~4k

Warnings: SLASH (don't like it, don't read it!), non-penetrative sex, handjobs, fluff, lots of spooning + cuddling. 18+ ONLY.

A/N: I can't believe this is the first Danny x Josh fic I've ever written. This idea of the 3-part series came to me suddenly and this one just poured out of me. Also, no, I am not at all rooting for any of the boys to have an IRL breakup LOL. But I do like playing up Danny in his Slut Era in fanfiction. I hope you enjoy ;)

---

Despite Josh usually feeling distinctly like a true older brother to Danny, there were times here and there that he didn’t. Danny thought it was just because Josh was naturally flirtatious–not even overtly, not in a seductive way even, but because he was so open and free and one of the most physical people he’d ever known. Sometimes the hugs went a little long; sometimes the brief touches were strong on Danny’s skin; sometimes the look in Josh’s eyes bordered on mischief, sometimes on what Danny could only describe to himself as desire. It always sent him into a bit of a tizzy when that happened, made him trip over his words when the time came to speak, or stumble, suddenly losing all grace and decorum. 

The first time he’d caught one of Josh’s not-so-brotherly looks was just before their second album was released. Danny could remember clearly within the context of that time–the sudden distress of a global pandemic, the distance, the struggle it had been to record, the change of management, the stress on all of their relationships within the band and beyond. So many changes between Anthem and now, he thought as he brushed his teeth in front of the hotel mirror, that he sometimes wasn’t sure how they’d even made it through. But now here they were, doing well enough to each get their own hotel rooms after producing a third full album and beginning another tour. 

After spitting and rinsing, he looked at himself, proud to think that he liked what he saw. A lot, actually. And it wasn’t just because so many of the fans thought he was hot–he’d seen the changes in himself, both unintentional and intentional, and felt like he’d grown into being the fiery (quite literally these days), solid beast of a drummer, the backbone and also the heartbeat of the band. So, in a way, he stopped being surprised when Josh would touch him for too long or look at him in that curious, wanting way; it was flattering. Danny embraced quiet praise more than vocal praise even to this day. 

The excitement of the tour seemed to be fizzing through all of them continually even despite the personal setbacks. Josh especially was dealing with a lot–a breakup that had seemed sudden to Danny until he heard more about the intricacies and drawn out hurdles, things he’d missed because Josh was so good at being private when he wanted to be. It had taken them all by surprise, really, and Danny felt for him. His own breakup had been difficult and he’d seen it coming from a mile away. But with Josh’s breakup, there had been a moment–or really, a long string of minutes suspended between them that felt like both an eternity and a second–when his older brother nature completely disappeared and he just wasn't. 

And secretly, Danny had been wanting something like that to happen again. So when a knock came upon his hotel room door and he opened it to see Josh standing there, barefoot and in slouchy, soft pajamas, his heart did a little flip. 

“I’m not tired,” Josh announced, taking it upon himself to breeze right past Danny and enter his space. There was that big brother energy, Danny thought, but it was still an unusual gift. Josh answered his silent question by saying, “Jake’s passed out and Sam is having a mutual masturbation session with his girlfriend.”

Danny snorted, shut the door. “Seriously?”

Josh laughed, plopping himself down on the foot of the bed. “I’m not entirely sure, but something along those lines, I imagine.” 

“Well,” Danny began, suddenly feeling sheepish. He and Josh had never talked about what happened before, right after the breakup–and while it wasn’t exactly fresh, it wasn’t exactly buried either. But Josh didn’t talk about things that didn’t need to be discussed–Danny knew that and decided to trust it. 

Josh looked up at him, that impish mischief twinkling in his dark eyes. “Don’t tell me you were going to bed already, Daniel.”

“I was only preparing,” Danny defended, still standing, not sure of what to do with himself, so he asked, noting once again that Josh was in PJs and clearly not ready to go out out, “What do you wanna do?”

Josh crawled up the bed and put himself right against the pillows, curling his legs up so he was nestled into the white pillows and propped up against the headboard. Danny could have laughed; he also could have choked, and a strange, strangled sound that was a bit like both came out at what he was witnessing. Thankfully, Josh didn’t seem to notice as he was making himself right at home. He just patted the space next to himself and said, “We could watch a movie.” 

With no other choice really, and not exactly wanting one anyway, Danny stepped through the low light, the soft golden glow from the bedside lamp and the slant of white light from the mostly-shut bathroom door. He got next to Josh but stayed on top of the blankets, hesitant. Wanting, but still hesitant. Josh had been pretty tipsy the last–and first–time they’d strayed out of “sibling” territory; he was sober now, Danny noted, but perhaps still vulnerable if Josh was coming to his room. If he really wanted to, Josh would wake Jake up or force Sam off the phone call or whatever. But then Danny remembered something Josh had said during that feverish, frenzied, raw time between the two of them. 

“You're always there,” Josh had said while his hands moved underneath Danny’s shirt, nimble fingers spreading over Danny’s abdomen and then further up to his chest. “You ground people, Danny. We'd be damn lost without you.”

At the time, Danny hadn’t registered how profound those words now sounded in his mind as he replayed them. Now, lounging next to Josh, he felt a swell of pride in his chest. 

He grabbed the remote. “I don’t even know what channels are on here. Is there Pay-Per-View or something? Is that still a thing?”

Josh chuckled. “Netflix exists, you know.”

“Oh.” Danny didn’t watch much TV when they were at hotels. He was surprised Josh was even privy to this information. 

“Oh boy,” Josh said with a small sigh, and Danny saw an amused little smile on his face as he reached across him with his whole body, extending his arm to find Danny’s phone on the other side of the bed. “Let me do it.” 

Danny let him take it, watched as Josh opened the app and connected it to the TV. “Been watching a lot of movies on your own lately?” he questioned, digging without really intending to dig, but the speculation was confirmed by Josh’s answer.

“Since I became single again,” he said, stealing the remote from Danny. “Sometimes film really is cathartic.” 

Sure, Danny thought, Josh was always passionate about film. It was just that some of that had taken a backseat since they’d blown up. A little chord of sadness was struck in his heart as he thought about Josh being unusually reclusive, relying on movies to get him through the dark times. Of course he’d also relied on Jake and Sam and, sure enough, Danny too, to get him through it all as well, but maybe Danny hadn’t realized how deeply Josh was still hurting.

“How’re you doing with that?” he asked as Josh flipped through the seemingly endless number of titles in the app. 

Josh glanced up at him, looking angelic in the dimness of the room, sharp cheekbones, sharp jaw but soft, gentle eyes and those pretty, full lips that Danny could remember feeling against his own. He expected more vulnerability, a broach to an open dialogue that would be both intimidating and curious, but Josh grinned and said, “Better with good company, my good man.” 

Danny chuckled. “Oh, good.” 

Josh finally settled on not a movie but a nature documentary, but Danny couldn’t focus much on the brilliant colors on the screen; he was fixated on the warm weight of Josh so close to him, almost touching, and the fresh, green scent of his damp hair and clean body. It didn’t take long for Josh to inch closer and closer until his head was on Danny’s shoulder and his hand was on Danny’s thigh–at that point, Danny was holding his breath, body stiff, totally unsure of how to play this out despite knowing what he wanted. He didn’t mind being a rebound of sorts, if that’s what this was, he just didn’t know if that’s what Josh wanted.

He decided he was just going to do his best to relax and go with the flow–he was good at that. He could do it, even if he did just want to haul Josh on top of himself and swallow him whole. Danny had never realized how strong his own attraction was to him until Josh had made that first move weeks ago–since then, he’d wanted more. Josh’s charisma had finally enticed him in a way well beyond just being friends and, yes, of course, brothers from other mothers. 

Josh was so quiet that Danny wondered if he’d actually just drifted to sleep, but then he felt the wandering hand on his thigh move up just a bit, the slight pressure making his skin tingle beneath his shorts. He stayed still; Josh reached for Danny’s left hand and took it, wrapping that strong arm around his waist, forcing Danny to hold him closer. And Danny knew Josh needed physical touch, that closeness, that most intimate intimacy–it was just who he was. So Danny wasn’t entirely a stranger to the occasional cuddle-fest, but this was the first one since their past encounter and the first time Josh’s hand had ever found itself so close to his crotch. He was willing himself to just leave at this and enjoy the close contact until Josh’s fingers tread along his waistband. 

“Josh,” Danny said, swallowing hard to prevent the annoying sound of him clearing his throat–he was finding it challenging to speak. “What do you want right now?” His voice was soft enough to make the question sound more gentle than it could have, thankfully, and it was truly all he wanted to know. 

Josh didn’t even hesitate. “I want you to touch me,” he said, turning on his side so Danny had to look at his face again, into the glittering bronze irises behind dark, long lashes. “I want to touch you.” 

There were questions that bubbled to the surface of Danny’s mind–Are you sure? What happened last time? Are you okay? Is this really what you want? But Josh always led with both his heart and mind–Danny told himself in the brief second he had before Josh hooked one small, muscular leg over his, that he wasn’t going to worry because he didn’t need to worry. So he grabbed that leg and pulled Josh closer, his arm around that lithe little waist hugging him tight against his torso; Danny saw a quick glimpse of a smile on Josh’s rosy lips before they were touching his own and then he was lost in the feeling, thoughts gone. 

It proved quickly to be a different experience to touch and kiss Josh while they were both sober. Josh’s kisses were a little slower, a little softer, and Danny matched the pace and pressure; Josh’s hands still felt all over Danny’s body, moving from thighs to stomach to chest and back down and all around, but there was less urgency and more exploration. Curiosity that Danny also felt, and he mirrored some of the touches against Josh’s back, feeling the muscle of his shoulders and the slight dip right above his ass. Josh made a little noise against Danny’s mouth when he touched there, lips parting wider, and Danny was happy to welcome the first touch of Josh’s tongue against his own while he dared to bring his hand lower. Maybe he could elicit another noise like that if he just–

Josh moaned, sweet and sinful, when Danny outright grabbed his ass, squeezing one cheek with more force than even he’d expected. He brought his lips to Josh’s jaw, taking a breath before he asked, “Like that?”

“Mhmm,” Josh answered, nodding. He started to grind himself against Danny’s thigh, making his hard-on known, and even though Danny had quite a clear idea of what Josh was packing thanks to those jumpsuits and the brief hold he’d had on him through their clothes last time, the heat, weight and size of what was pressed against his leg was still a little intimidating. More intimidating was the fact that Danny’s only other experience came from Josh’s brothers, something he was pretty sure Josh was still entirely unaware of.

Danny bit his own lip when Josh managed to get a hand down his shorts. He was hard too, which Josh seemed exceptionally pleased with–he pulled back, grinning, cheeks flushed and eyes sparkling. “Ooh, Danny,” he purred, glancing down as if he could actually see what he was grabbing through Danny’s shorts. “Why haven’t I seen this before?” 

“I’m pretty sure you have,” Danny said, remembering that time he and Sam were wasted and decided to skinny dip, leaving Josh and Jake behind because the lake was “too cold.” Not to mention the countless showers and other hotel rooms. Surely Josh had sneaked peeks before.

“I wanna see it again,” Josh told him, tugging on the waistband while pushing Danny’s shirt up at the same time enough to reveal that famed happy trail and a slight strip of pubic hair. “Do you wanna see me too?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I do,” Danny said, dizzy and hot but managing to grab the hem of Josh’s shirt. Josh’s grasp on him left to finish the job, tugging his shirt over his head, and Danny’s hands flew to the firm, warm chest, grabbing Josh under his arms. He pulled him on top and then Josh flew into action, writhing on top of him, humping Danny hard while he attacked his mouth. 

While Josh’s teeth found Danny’s bottom lip, his hands found the pesky t-shirt again and they broke apart for him to tear it away from Danny’s body; Danny shivered both from the sudden blast of the a/c and Josh’s hands running up his sides, one landing on the side of his neck, fingers brushing through his hair. When the desperate, fast movements of Josh’s hands sliding down between them, pawing at his shorts to urge Danny to get them off, he couldn’t even comprehend the feeling of gratitude and confidence that was coming to life inside of him. Even more when Josh, slithering down his body, eyes gazing over every exposed inch of him, looked up and said, “God, you are so gorgeous.” 

Sure, Danny had gained so much confidence over the years, but hearing that from Josh was a different story, even if Josh was always generous with his compliments. But now those words were dripping with sensuality and desire, the slow, low delivery of them lingering in Danny’s ears. He couldn’t reply when Josh got both of them completely naked and climbed back on top, hands clasping the sides of Danny’s face, kissing him deep and slow. 

And Danny knew what he was doing in bed most of the time, and Josh had told him what he wanted–for Danny to touch him. So his own hands moved languidly around Josh’s body, stroking his arms, gliding over his back around to his abdomen, around again to squeeze his ass again and bring them closer, their erections finally making contact. Josh moaned again, smothered by Danny’s lips and then his tongue slipping into his mouth, and Danny reciprocated, a rumble deep in chest just barely audible. He couldn’t hear the TV anymore and wondered when Josh had managed to mute it, but the flicker of blue and green glow flashed beyond his closed eyes; when he opened them, catching some air, Josh was cast in it, a halo of cool light around his messy curls. 

“How do you wanna–?” Danny asked, sensing this pause was building up to something more. Josh rolled off him and onto his side, facing away, and grabbed Danny’s hand again to rope him over; Danny followed dutifully, now able to sense more of what Josh wanted. He hooked his leg over Josh’s and his arm over his chest, pressing his own chest to Josh’s back, his nose in that damp hair. Josh reached back to grab Danny’s hair in turn while he brought Danny’s hand down to his cock. 

“Jesus Christ,” Danny said softly, really just to himself while he was caught in a daze, fighting to follow purely instinct and not give way to any trepidation. Consequences could come later. But if Jake and Sam were any indicator, he actually felt like the chance of there being none was good. He knew his place in the entire band now. So would Josh like what his brothers like? He tested the waters, cupping and lightly squeezing Josh’s balls; Josh squealed and Danny stopped, thinking that no, he absolutely did not like that, but then Josh wiggled back against him and asked him to do it again. 

“Tell me what you like,” Danny requested, thinking that Josh actually using his words would be more interesting than just mimicking what he’d done with others. 

“That. I like that,” Josh told him, tugging on Danny’s hair, arching his back when Danny repeated the action. “You’ve got big hands, Danny–use them.”

Danny groaned. He rubbed his own hard cock against Josh’s ass as he began to stroke him, his, yes, big and undoubtedly skilled hand wrapped around Josh, who was starting to leak precum into his palm. Danny used that–he rubbed his palm over Josh’s slit and fisted the wetness around him and the sound Josh made assured Danny that he was grateful for the lubrication. Danny brought his chin to Josh’s shoulder, turned his head to nibble at his ear and down his neck, slight bites turning into wet kisses. 

As vocal as ever, Josh was freely letting whines, moans and the occasional pleas and praise slip from his mouth, and Danny was trembling behind and around him. He was finding it increasingly difficult to stay where he was, just spooning and just jerking him off, but if this is what Josh wanted, so be it–he didn’t doubt he was going to bust his own load soon enough with the friction he was creating by his own grind and Josh’s constant movement. With the other hand that had been resting on Josh’s chest, locking them together, he tilted Josh’s face to his and angled himself right enough to kiss him again; Josh tugged even harder at Danny’s hair, making his scalp sting but it only fueled the fire within to the point that he had to warn Josh of his impending combustion. The closeness, the shared sweat and heat, the novelty of being tangled up with Josh was such a delirious turn-on. Danny had no idea how he was going to navigate this after the fact, but that warning thought quickly disappeared as Josh’s teeth dug into his lip and his cock twitched and leaked in Danny’s hand. 

There was absolutely no warning when Josh abruptly shoved him backwards. Danny blinked, vision blurry with the still-flashing TV screen before Josh’s form shielded it; he got on top yet again, strong thighs clamped around Danny’s hips. Danny grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him down while Josh tried to stroke both of their cocks together, but Danny had to take over, his bigger hands coming to the rescue. Josh shuddered and spared Danny’s swollen lips, navigating his own kisses to his flushed neck; Danny stroked and groped his ass again while Josh rode his thighs, teeth grazing his skin, tongue flicking out to soothe the bites.

“Fuck,” was all Danny could manage to say when he felt himself getting closer and closer, overwhelmed in the best way possible. He’d certainly imagine sex with Josh in the past few weeks but his imagination hadn’t been skilled enough to truly embody what it felt like. 

“Yeah, Danny, that’s good,” Josh rasped out, hands gripping his shoulders until one came to grab his jaw, forcing Danny to look right at him. When Danny did, brow furrowed, throat tight while so close to the edge, Josh stared into his eyes and bit down on his own bottom lip until the rest of his face unraveled into an expression of orgasm that Danny definitely couldn’t picture in his imagination no matter how similar that face looked to Josh’s stage performances.

Danny looked down at the pearly streaks painted between his fingers and on his belly, stark white against his tan and black hair. The release didn’t stop Josh from grinding harder and taking Danny’s erection in his own hand, but his return to kisses was sloppy and extra wet. Saliva dripped from his mouth to Danny’s and down both of their chins and that alone made Danny’s impending release surge forward, a tight coil in his stomach turning tighter before he suddenly snapped and dug his fingers into Josh’s back, spilling between them. 

And when he opened his eyes, breathing hard, Josh was smiling down at him. “Do you always come that much?”

Danny looked down at himself again. “Uh–hm. I guess so?” He just couldn’t think right now. His heart was a drum of its own in his chest while his head felt light and airy, mind lacking the ability to process what had just happened. 

Josh got off him and onto his side once more, this time remaining facing him, gazing up at him with his hands tucked beneath the side of his head. “Please don’t tell me you’re going to kick me out now, Daniel.” He sighed dramatically. “I have a fragile heart.”

“And that’s why you came here?” Danny asked, settling down next to him though he did really want to zip into the bathroom to clean himself off. That could wait, he supposed, because maybe Josh was actually opening up here. 

“I didn’t come here with the intention of sex,” Josh said, his eyes earnest, solidifying truth in the words. “I wouldn’t use you like that. Unless you feel like I did?”

Danny smiled a little. “No. I’m actually kind of grown up now, in case you’ve forgotten. I would say ‘no’ if I didn’t want to.” 

“So you wanted to?”

“Sure. Why not?” 

Josh paused, eyes searching Danny’s face, then he asked, “So you’re alright with what happened before? Right after the breakup?” 

“Of course. I–I mean, I was hoping something would happen again,” Danny confessed, finding himself lulled by his post-orgasm haze and Josh’s sweet, serene face. “I think I’m just a little surprised it did.”

Josh cuddled up against him, pressing his face against his chest while Danny draped his arms over his back. “You’re very comforting, you know. You didn’t even have to say much to make me feel better,” he said, and warmth bloomed in Danny’s chest at the words. “Just you being there helped–and does help–so much.” Josh looked up, peeking through curls that had fallen into his face. “And you have the best hugs of anyone I know.”

“Well, I’ll keep hugging you until you’re all healed up,” Danny assured him, completely meaning it. 

“I love that. I love you.” Josh brought his head back down and Danny felt the butterfly kisses of eyelashes fluttering against his chest. “Just don’t tell Jake and Sam. I fear they’ll be too jealous to handle it.”

Danny laughed. “Jealous? What do you mean?”

“Oh come on, Daniel,” Josh said, words muffled. “You think Sam’s ever kept his mouth shut about you two? You think I can’t pull a secret out of Jake?” 

“Oh shit,” Danny said, and Josh giggled. “Are you serious? You knew?” 

Josh’s cackle tickled Danny’s skin. “Okay, I didn’t know details, but now I think I can fill in the blanks.”

“Damn.” Danny felt utterly screwed, but he wasn’t sure why–apparently everything was fine. Apparently the Kiszkas were perfectly content to share as much as he was. 

“You belong to us,” Josh said, and Danny’s heart flipped again. “As much as we belong to you.”

---

Tagging: no one (RIP the 2018-2021 fandom lmao). If you ever wanna be tagged in my fics, let me know <3

[inquixotic]

JOSH & SEB (ft. MADDOX & RHYS), MORNING 25.

@graftisms, @properbantz, @dxncingonmyown 

sebastien cassidy.

sebastien has been a lot calmer since the prior days events, after talking to enough people to have separation between the fight and josh himself. but even still, he could not resist poking the bear still, when he saw josh in the lounge area. “so have you untwisted your panties?”   @deanna

josh vargas.

it's one of the rare times today that josh hasn't been glued to jenny's side. since last night, he's been spending an obnoxious amount of time with her--partly due to making up for what they missed, and partly to give everyone in the villa what they've been asking for. he's sipping a drink waiting for her to come back wherever she is when seb has the audacity to speak to him. his eyes roll. "i have nothing to say to you, man."

sebastien cassidy.

he snorts at his response, making a faux sympathetic face at him. “so you’re just going to ignore me forever?” sebastien is practically glowing with glee, feeling sort of victorious with how clearly josh does not want him around, only sweetening his plans. “we could just kiss and makeup, you know. the audience would go wild.”

josh vargas.

"just until you get kicked off, which i give a day or two." his anger is faded from last night, but that doesn't mean josh intends on being seb's friend again. he tried that route, and it didn't work so well. "you'd like that, wouldn't you?" the smirk he sends seb is cold. "what was it you said--you like people who are bad for you? must be hard to find someone worse than yourself." all spoken very casually, for the record.

sebastien cassidy.

“unless your little friend picks me, no?” his smile is positively cheshire, not exclusively using rhys to rub into josh’s face but it was nice to have that as a benefit. “sure, i’d love to do some charity work,” he grins back, ignoring the frost from josh’s side. “i know i said i’m over my straight man phase, but i would make an exception for you, to get someone worse than myself.” his reply is blasè, smiling at josh as if nothing happened.

josh vargas.

"what friend?" he asks, genuinely unsure which friend of his would ever pick seb. don't tell josh he doesn't have many friends to choose between. he's not really sure where this conversation is going, blinking because... did seb just hit on him? "you couldn't handle me," he says simply, annoyed by the way seb is grinning at him. he misses when he was all pissed off.

sebastien cassidy.

“you have more than one?” annoyingly returning josh’s question with one of his own each time, doing his best to tick him off again. even though he’s calmer now, there’s still the itch under his skin for a fight. his grin stretches further when josh seems confused, pleased that his flirting has the right effect. “try me,” he returns, taking a step closer, shit eating grin annoyingly present. he’s basically playing chicken with seeing how long it takes for josh to hit him or storm off again.

josh vargas.

well, when he says it like that... josh hardly figures seb could mean romi or marcus. "rhys has better taste than that," he scoffs, remembering how his friend had (kinda) stood up for him last night to seb.  rhys might not actually have good taste, but surely he's not that desperate. staying where he's seated, eyebrows arch up at seb. if he wants to play games, josh won't be the first to back off. "are you that desperate right now, dude? you could suck my dick and i still wouldn't pick you." but he's welcome to try.

sebastien cassidy.

“does he?” he asks blandly, his smile still sparking with mischief. rhys dated mimi, so seb is sure he’s more his type than josh would be willing to admit — he could handle her, after all. “who said anything about sucking dicks?” his eyebrows go up similar fashion, purposely mimicking him. he bends down so he’s close to josh’s face. “you want to kiss me so bad.” it’s practically a whisper, eyes narrowed at him. and part of him even maybe believes it. why else would he only have beef with two extremely good looking guys? “i would rather go home than couple with you, even if you are the only one worse than me.”

josh vargas.

eyes narrow lightly, wondering if there's something seb knows that josh doesn't. maybe he shouldn't assume, but the idea of seb and rhys together makes him sick to his stomach. the french man crouching down in front of him makes him take a deep breath through his nose, fighting off the urge to shove him away. if this is his tactic for trying to get josh to punch him and get kicked out of the villa, it's a good one. "i'd say my fist in the wall last night says otherwise." he struggles to keep his voice even, trying to figure out where the hell his mind is. "funny, something we finally have in common. i'd rather you go home, too. and it seems like you're the one here that's begging for me to kiss you. you're practically on your knees."

sebastien cassidy.

he feels like josh is probably seconds from storming off again, and that keeps the lazy smile on his face. he would love for josh to haul off and smack the shit out of him, but he expects that he’ll be able to keep his composure, unluckily for seb. “romantic,” he drawls in answer to the fist in the wall, smirking. his hand moves to lift josh’s chin, sure he wouldn’t let him go that far, but he’s playing chicken still. “see, you say that but you are the one kneeling?” he’s sitting, but same difference in terms of height for sebs purposes of just pissing him off. he did have to respect josh’s commitment here to not getting angry, but seb would just keep pushing. “i don’t need to beg, darling. i could just ask your little boyfriend if i wanted a kiss.”

josh vargas.

he tenses when seb reaches out to touch him, jaw clenching in annoyance. this is  the part where he'd storm off, but too many people have made that joke to him in the past twenty-four hours for him to follow through. he doesn't care what people think anymore, he tells himself. he doesn't care that someone's bound to see them in this position, and the joke will probably be turned onto him. "this is called sitting," he says with as much patience as he can muster, saying the word slowly, because english isn't seb's first language. "what are you doing?" he can't help but laugh, pushing seb's hand away, but keeping the close distance. josh just can't stand the idea of someone else being in control. "keep calling him my boyfriend, and i'd think someone's jealous," he smirks over at him. not sure where this is going, just that he's not going to be the one to back off.

sebastien cassidy.

josh tensing is exactly the effect he wanted to have, but he doesn’t back off. annoyance darts  across sebastien’s face, like a flash in the pan, gone as soon as it appeared as he regains his composure and control. the other man speaks slowly, as if he won’t understand and his eyes narrow. “does it matter? you are beneath me.” he smiles at his double entendre. josh pushes his hand away, calls him jealous, and seb feels as if he’s won then, in a way. but the fact that he hasn’t left in a huff sours it, and so he leans further down, his hand moving back to josh’s chin, tilting his face up to bring his lips down to meet the others.

josh vargas.

i didn't talk you as a top, josh almost sneers back, sure that's some kind of insult. but the words quickly die on his lips when he's silenced by seb's own lips. for a second josh can't actually believe it's happening, sitting motionless in place. he could pull away, be as disgusted as he feels, but maybe he does still care how he's perceived, because the last thing he wants is to be come across as homophobic or something. so his eyes roll to the ceiling before they flutter shut and he kisses the bastard back, face flushing with heat at the annoyance he feels. his hand reaches to grab seb's hand and push it away from his face, instead trapping it between josh's hand and seb's leg.

rhys aldridge.

it's interesting that he was looking for either one of the two in the situation he's happened to stumble upon. what did he stumble upon? josh is liplocked with seb, his hand pinning the other's to his leg. perhaps everything with dylan and naomi had been what planted the seed of jealousy that already crept its way up slowly, but there was something about this, yes this in particular, that made him feel like it had taken his heart and spliced through the arteries and veins that kept his being. love island sure, love island, everyone was looking for love, everyone had their person. that was his person, josh was his person. platonically of course, entirely platonically. he almost laughs, the sound catching in his throat in what sounds like a scoff at his imposition upon their sweet little moment, hair falling in his face as he shakes his head in disbelief. his eyes scan the area briefly (is anyone else seeing this?) before bowing out, not wanting to cause a scene. he'll find josh later.

maddox montgomery.

Of the things Maddox expects to find, Rhys in a standstill isn’t it. He’s unmoving, and he quirks a brow. Tilting his head, he peers from behind him, and his fist tightens in an unconscious fist. Well - who would have thought Josh had it in him to be that interesting? Maddox clenches his jaw. After grafting Jenny and laying some mediocre-length pipe in her runway… this is what he finds Josh doing? He catches Rhys’ eye as he begins to walk away, tense silence hanging in the air. “Don’t wanna stay for the show mate?” He asks in a whisper, enough not to startle whatever that is. If this was a hoax, or a last ditch attempt to fuck up the recoupling. Maddox didn’t know. But he admits, he’s curious, and just a little intrigued. “Or is voyeurism not your speed?”

rhys aldridge.

"fuck off." he's sighing, brushing past maddox to get the mental image of whatever that was out of his head.

sebastien cassidy.

the kiss is just too long before seb pulls away, still a little surprised josh even let him do that. his face is flushed and sebastien isn’t sure if it’s because he’s angry or embarrassed or something else. “there you are, finally shut up.” it’s said with triumph, pleased with himself. at least until he turns and sees h maddox and rhys, the latter walking away. oops. there goes his chance of staying.

josh vargas.

"you wanted to kiss me so bad," he smirk is smug when seb pulls away, pleased to have not been the one to pull away. he had kissed marcus before--barely--but this had been a real kiss, and josh... didn't hate it? it might've been a little more enjoyable if it hadn't basically been coercion with his least favorite person. "i hope that'll keep your spank bank warm for a minute, sebby." his hand lifts off his leg to pat him on the cheek, just a little harder than necessary. of course the next thing he does is look around to see if anyone noticed, lips pressing into a straight line at maddox and... rhys? the latter probably didn't see it, otherwise he would've heard shit. "see something you like, montgomery?" he calls over to maddox, flipping him off.

sebastien cassidy.

“if you need more fuel for your awakening, just let me know,” he returns, grinning with malice. josh can be as big of an asshole as he wanted, seb would consider that a win, even if josh did not storm off like he had wanted him to. now he could be the target of seb’s “straight” man jokes even more so. he claps josh’s shoulder in return about as hard as he patted his cheek. “i would think the whole villa would enjoy you being secure in yourself, vargas,” it’s not really a defense for maddox watching, because he doesn’t think there’s anything to defend him from — not like maddox would have feelings for josh.

josh vargas.

"well it's nice to know you'd kiss just about anyone for five extra minutes of screen time," he snides, eyes rolling before he rises to his feet. apparently jenny is just never coming back, and at this point, he doesn't want her to return to this. "tell your right hand i say goodbye, pepe."

maddox montgomery.

“Stunning performance, chaps. Can’t blame two blokes for looking. Though,” Maddox shrugs, pointing to the dust of disappointment Rhys left behind. “I don’t think everyone was as much of a fan.” Hand to heart, mockery covering up whatever interest crept to the surface. And, because he can’t help himself from stirring up this mess, he looks past Josh and his middle finger and smirks at Seb. “Well? I got anything to worry about?” He asks cheekily, as if they were having private bro talk in the bedroom instead of gassing Josh up. If Josh was gonna fuck around with his girl and start making out with his mates, he’d at least hear shit about it. After all, Seb and his defiance aside, Josh was his arch nemesis.

sebastien cassidy.

he snickers, and cocks his head at maddox. “nothing to worry about, mon ami,” he answers, a dismissive wave of his hand pairing with it. josh is not a bad kisser, but like hell would he say that. plus, he was a little stiff. he does feel a little bad that rhys was upset, though he assumes it is because of him, of course. he would have to apologize later. “it was like kissing a fish. i’m surprised jenny is still stuck on him, if that’s what she’s getting.” he plays into maddox’s decision to ignore josh completely, let him have his moment to clown on the other man, since he is trying to leave maddox at risk. “i think you will be fine.”

josh vargas.

"that's not what she said last night," he counters, predictably. "not that you'd know, since she wasn't in bed with you," he smirks at maddox, slowly moving to pass them h. maddox's comment has him wondering if he should find rhys. maybe there was something between him and seb? "next time if you want a kiss, buy me dinner first," he calls to seb, heading towards the kitchen. "i'll be more likely to put out."

sebastien cassidy.

“you’re still not my type, mon amor,” he returns, chuckling. two bottoms does not a relationship make.

[blessed-artist]

I was tagged by the amazing @impossiblepluto! Thank you so much for tagging me! 💙

Favorite music to bring Christmas spirit to your home?

In our family it’s not Christmas until you listen to Josh Groban and Celine Dion’s Christmas albums. We always listen to those on the ride home from celebrating thanksgiving at my grandmothers!

Movie you have to watch during the Christmas season?

There are several but the one that really stands out for me is It’s a Wonderful Life. That’s the one that my family usually tries to watch together! Honorable mentions include White Christmas, Home Alone, and Frosty the Snowman!

Favorite way to decorate for Christmas?

For me the most important decoration is the tree. We go cut down our own and then turn on music and usually make cider while we decorate! There is always an ongoing “argument” over what color lights to put on the tree even though we always put colored lights on the tree and plain white lights on the house outside. We also have an elaborate nativity that we set up on top of the tv.

Do you have special Christmas-y clothes?

Not as many as I would like, but some! I have one that is a T-shirt that says “auntie elf” and then a Christmas sweater with reindeer, as well as a Wonder Woman Christmas sweater!

Favorite smell of Christmas?

Christmas trees! The smell of fir is one of my all time favorite scents! I have a candle in my room right now that is fur scented! Also cinnamon rolls. Not technically Christmas I guess, but my parents make them from scratch every year on Christmas morning!

Tagging with no pressure! @madsophiehatter @duchess-of-mischief @i-am-a-stupid-robot and anyone who wants to do this!

[johnny-2000s]

🌟 Relive the Best Episodes from the Golden Age of Teen TV! 🌟

Join me on a nostalgic journey through some of the most iconic episodes from Disney Channel and Nickelodeon’s teen TV shows of the 2000s! From the chaotic humor of Drake & Josh in "The Wedding" to the heartfelt moments of Hannah Montana in "The Way We Almost Weren’t," this video dives deep into the episodes that made us laugh, cry, and everything in between. We revisit the quirky adventures of Ned’s Declassified, the musical fun of The Naked Brothers Band, the stylish drama of True Jackson, VP, and many more. Whether you were a fan of iCarly’s twisty plots, Big Time Rush’s wild antics, or That’s So Raven’s magical mischief, these episodes are sure to bring back all the feels! 📺✨

Which episode was your favorite? Let’s chat in the comments and relive these unforgettable moments together!

[lindamartin1080]

Star City Bio + Info

Below the cut here is specific information about Zachary that was developed over his time in the Star City RP:

Star City Updates

Past Employment: It’s been revealed that Linda spent some time working in Gotham during her career before moving to L.A. She worked as a therapist in Arkham Asylum and as such has had past interactions with several of Gotham’s rogue gallery, including one Dr. Harleen Quinzel before Joker broke her mind and The Clown Prince of Crime himself. She even had a hand in helping Gotham PD solve cases and a few interactions with members of the BatClan before The Hero Ban came into effect.

The Threat of NOVA: Linda took on an increasing amount of powered individuals as patients during her time in Star City. Her reputation for expertise with particularly difficult experiences (which Lucifer helped prepare her for) eventually reached the ears of NOVA and she became a target. Linda fled to District X; a safe haven blocked off from the main city for powered individuals to live safely. While there she began working at a small clinic with Josh Foley to continue seeing powered people and help them work whatever issues they needed to. Following NOVA’s expulsion from the city, Linda now works between the small clinic in District X, and her office in Star City, working to see as many patients as possible and has become something of an expert in therapy for the super-powered.

To Be Young Again: Thanks to the God of Mischief taking her desires a little too literally, Linda got to relive her time as a twenty-one-year-old for a few weeks. The experience was both freeing and terrifying and helped her appreciate that being a little older isn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, the ‘attack’ on her worried Magneto since Linda’s mind houses some of the inner-most secrets for powerful figures; so, he and Quentin Quire began giving her lessons on how to properly protect her mind and she’s been a diligent student. While she couldn’t fight off a sustained telepathic attack by any means, Linda now has the skill to wall off her mind to a degree and keep the secrets of others safe as well as be aware of when she’d experiencing a mental attack.

[lokitvsource]

‘Loki’ star Tom Hiddleston: ‘I was very engaged with the idea of breaking Loki open’

Tom Hiddleston first appeared as Loki in 2011’s “Thor,” but the God of Mischief made a bigger splash, burdened with glorious purpose and all, in 2012’s “The Avengers,” which marks its 10th anniversary on May 4 and has the “Loki” star feeling “very old, basically.”

“I can’t believe 10 years has gone by so fast,” Hiddleston tells Gold Derby (watch the exclusive video interview above). “Amazed, surprised, delighted that I’m still playing the character. I have loved playing this character in every iteration. Loki seems to contain so much breadth and depth, so many surprises for me, for the audience. It’s an honor to have played him for the length of time that I had. Loki’s an ancient character, been around a long time, will be around a lot longer than me. It feels great.”

There have been multiple times when it seemed like the actor was done playing Loki. The fan favorite was supposed to die in “Thor: The Dark World” (2013) until test audiences refused to believe Loki was dead, and he did die in the opening minutes of “Avengers: Infinity War” (2018) at the hands of Thanos (Josh Brolin), completing an arc from big bad to antihero. But the time heist in “Avengers: Endgame” (2019) presented another chance to bring Loki back to life after he makes off with the Tesseract during the Battle of New York, creating a branched timeline off the Sacred Timeline. The Loki of “Loki,” of course, is not the same one who sacrificed himself for Thor (Chris Hemsworth) in “Infinity War” — having made peace with himself and his anger toward his adoptive family — but the 2012 version, a charmingly narcissistic “puny god” who craved power above all else.

Revisiting the unredeemed Loki and approaching him in a new way excited the Emmy nominee. “I was very engaged with the idea of breaking Loki open,” Hiddleston says. “Any questions around identity I’ve always found interesting — how we define ourselves to ourselves, the context of the stories we tell about ourselves to other people in order to find meaning in the world. And in so many ways the series was about integrating the disparate fragments of the many selves that Loki is. I think that’s a really universal experience. I think all human beings have to constantly integrate the fragments of who we are to a whole and make sense of that. So the idea of doing that with Loki just seemed a thrilling prospect. He’s the archetypal trickster, the transgressive, the boundary-crosser, the shapeshifter, somebody so expert at changing shape. And so the question we had in our minds was, who is he really? Who is Loki? What makes Loki Loki?”

After getting captured by the Time Variance Authority, Loki is forced to confront his past, future (and future death), other Loki variants (Alligator Loki FTW), and someone who might know him better than he knows himself, Agent Mobius (Owen Wilson). “The great conceit of the TVA is that putting Loki inside this institution strips him of everything that’s familiar — Thor, Odin, Asgard, his magical power, his clothing. And by taking everything away, Loki is challenged to reveal something about what remains — or we were challenged to find what remains of Loki and what the new journey is,” Hiddleston continues, adding that director Kate Herron had “the most wonderful take” on Loki’s Season 1 arc. “When I met her for the first time, within five minutes, I think I asked her what do you think the series is about and she said, ‘I think it’s about acceptance, permission and love.’ And I thought, ‘She gets it!'”

By the end of the first season, Loki is a lot different from the entitled agent of chaos he was at the start — and is also in a different timeline after Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) killed He Who Remains (Jonathan Majors) and opened the multiverse. While we have to wait and see what Season 2 brings, another Asgardian adventure is coming first. “Thor: Love and Thunder,” the trailer for which dropped last week, opens July 8 and will be the first “Thor” film in which Hiddleston — as far as everyone knows right now — does not appear as Loki. Or does he?

“At this point, I’ve learned to live with the question,” Hiddleston teases. “Loki might pop up. Loki has range. Loki can be Matt Damon, he can be Richard E. Grant, he can be Alligator Loki. I’m not placing any bets, I’ll say that, but it does look fantastic.”

[twh-news]

Tom Hiddleston made his glorious debut as Loki in 2011's Thor, which celebrated its 10th anniversary exactly two weeks ago today. Since then, the 40-year-old actor's God of Mischief has gone on a remarkable journey in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as he grappled with the living in his heroic brother Thor's (Chris Hemsworth) shadow and evolved from villain to antihero. Now, it's time for Loki to step into the spotlight on Disney+'s Loki. Ahead of the six-episode drama's premiere, though, EW asked Hiddleston to take us through Loki's greatest hits.

The audition (2009)

It's well-known that Hiddleston actually auditioned for Thor's titular role. "I remember thinking I should probably do some exercise because Thor is a very athletic character. So I did that, got into his kind of regime and did my camera test, and put on the blonde wig, and swung the hammer," he says. "But I do remember on the piece of paper I signed, it said, 'The role of Thor/Loki.' I thought, 'Okay...' Long-story short: Chris Hemsworth is definitive in the role of Thor. I certainly think so, and the right decision was made on that day. I'm very glad it went the way it went."

Thor (2011)

Directed by Kenneth Branagh, The first Thor contains the scene that truly set the stage for Hiddleston and Loki's post-Avengers breakout. After discovering he's actually descended from the Frost Giants, Loki confronts his (adopted) father, Odin (Anthony Hopkins), about the deception in a harrowing and transformative scene. "That's the creation, in a way, of Loki's status as a villain, is this intense feeling of marginalization and isolation, [and] that he does not belong, that Thor is not his brother," says Hiddleston. "I'll never forget doing that scene because I had such respect, and still do, for Sir Anthony Hopkins, and suddenly I was having to play tennis with him in a very emotional place."

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige adds: "There's just so much pain and angst in it. I think that is the moment that Tom really got his hooks into the audience."

The Avengers (2012)

Loki has many memorable moments in The Avengers, but Hulk interrupting the "puny" god's egomaniacal speech and pounding him to the ground is the funniest. "I had a piece of wire tied to my ankle and there was a mat on the floor, which was out of shot, and three of the strongest stunt guys holding the wire at the end behind the camera. The experience being yanked out of frame was one I will not forget in a hurry," says Hiddleston, explaining he was the only one in front of the camera when they shot it because Mark Ruffalo didn't perform the role via motion-capture in that first Avengers film. "For about two years after that, I couldn't go through airports anywhere in the world without somebody kind of going, 'Hey, Mr. Loki, I love it when you get Hulk smashed.' It became a bit of a thing in a fun way,"

Thor: The Dark World (2013)

Loki loves to use his powers to guard himself both physically and emotionally, as seen in Thor: The Dark World when Thor visits his imprisoned brother after the Dark Elves murdered their mother. At first, Loki is smug as always and everything seems in order, but Thor calls him out and the illusion dissipates, revealing that Loki is broken and grieving. "There's this love of their mother that unites these two brothers, adopted or not, and they form a kind of unpredictable and unstable alliance," says Hiddleston. "That scene was really key to anchoring that film in something honest and emotional."

Thor: Ragnarok (2017)

Loki learns nothing hurts like apathy when his brother reveals he's completely given up on him in this pivotal elevator scene from Taika Waititi's eccentric and warm threequel. "I think it really affects Loki. He thinks, 'Oh maybe I got this wrong. Maybe I did have a place in that family. Maybe this guy is my brother.' But it was a really enjoyable scene because it was just a very quiet moment with Chris in a very calm space in a big, colorful, spectacular film" says Hiddleston.

Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

After evading death many times, Loki finally met his end when Thanos (Josh Brolin) crushed his windpipe — but not before delivering a powerful speech in which he accepted all parts of himself, the Frost Giant and the Asgardian. "The redemption of Loki as a character was achieved in that moment of sacrifice and catharsis — that after all this time, after all this journey of feeling marginalized and fueled by jealous rage, he would risk his life to save his brother and call himself an Odinson. And I saw this perfect closure in a way," says Hiddleston. "I remember Josh Brolin could not have been sweeter. He was so generous. I walked into the room and he turned around and saw me come in, and just broke into this big wide smile, and opened up his arms, and enveloped me in a big hug and said, 'I'm sorry, man.'"

Avengers: Endgame (2019)

But Infinity War wasn't the end for Loki. Hiddleston appeared as the Avengers-era version of his character for Endgame's time heist. "It was really enjoyable to go back to this version of this character that I played before all of the evolution with those actors who I got to know so well and we'd all been on this journey together," he says. Of course, that Loki ends up stealing the Tesseract and disappearing, setting the stage for the Disney+ series. "Where does he go? When does he go? How does he get there?"

Loki (2021)

"If you've seen the trailer for Loki the show, you will know that Loki finds himself face-to-face with the TVA, the Time Variance Authority, who are an organization within Marvel Comics that govern the order of time," Hiddleston says. "I suppose Loki picking up the Tesseract in Endgame might have caused some concern. It is very exciting. The world of the TVA is a world of bureaucratic order, and of course Loki is the God of Mischief and Chaos. So you have the forces of order and chaos coming together, and that's where our story starts."

Bonus moment: Thor: The Dark World (2013)

At one point in the Thor sequel, Loki shape-shifts into Captain America, with Chris Evans making a cameo, while he and his brother escape Asgard. However, there's a version of that scene in which Hiddleston actually puts on the star-spangled hero's costumes himself. "[That] was a very strange and surreal moment, nevertheless enjoyable. So I got to feel whatever the feeling of wearing that suit [is], which is definitely a moment," Hiddleston recalls. "Then, they played that footage to Chris, and he did his best impression of me doing an impression him, and he does it brilliantly." High-praise from the God of impressions.

[ghostficwriter]

A Kiss For Luck - Part 3: Take It

Pairing / Form: Wheeler Yuta x Reader Genre: Misc Warnings: n/a Word Count: 490 Plot: Reader looks for Yuta after his match at Supercard of Honor, but he seems to have disappeared. 

You found yourself biting at your nails as you watched Yuta lock up with Josh Woods. You had no idea who was supposed to win, but you were certain of this: you were going to kiss Wheeler Yuta tonight, and properly this time. Whether it was a distraction from the disappointment of losing or an exhilaration of celebration remained to be seen. 

When the match ended, you couldn’t help but adore the triumph on his face. You couldn’t wait to see him! But, he was nowhere to be found after the match. You’d seen him posing with other wrestlers for photos, the title proudly displayed on his shoulder, but then he disappeared. You were so busy looking for him that you missed the rest of the show, and when people started packing up, you realized it simply wasn’t going to happen. 

It stung a bit, that he didn’t seem to be looking for you either. Maybe you read too much into his reaction the last time you spoke. Oh well, it seemed you’d have to wait until Dynamite. Or many you shouldn’t bother…

Your doubts were interrupted by a firm hand around your wrist, pulling you through a doorway.

Yuta kept his hand around your wrist, and placed the other on your shoulder to stabilize you as you stumbled into the room. The first time you’d rendezvoused with him after a match, he was fresh from the ring, but this time he was showered, changed, and breathing evenly.

But his eyes held the same alluring fire.

“You said I needed to earn it.” He was put together on the outside, but his voice was husky. “How did I do?”

You were so taken aback you simply blinked up at him for a moment before nodding.

And then, he was leaning in, and you were closing your eyes - but his lips didn’t meet yours, instead they pressed to your cheek. 

You looked up at him in confusion, and he chuckled, mischief in his eyes. “Doesn’t feel so good does it?” 

“Well, if that’s all you needed,” you patted his cheek and began to turn away, but he tugged you back by the wrist.

“It certainly wasn’t all I wanted.” 

You smirked. “You know I was planning on kissing you whether you won or not.”

Yuta started to reply, but you put your finger on his lips (and may have noticed how soft they felt), “Don’t get me wrong, I love your confidence…your aggression.” You looked away for a moment, pushing your embarrassment aside. “But I’ve liked you for a long time, and I like the goofy, relaxed Yuta just as much as the confident…ring-worn Yuta…so I guess what I’m trying to say is…my good luck kisses? They’re yours…” And then you were pulling him in again, and tasting fire again, but this time it wasn’t a short candle flicker, it was a bonfire, fierce and enduring and the first of many.

~ <3 FIN <3 ~

[lokiondisneyplus]

undefined

'Loki' takes over: Tom Hiddleston on his new TV series and a decade in the MCU

Ten years after Hiddleston first chose chaos in Thor, Marvel’s fan favorite God of Mischief is going even bigger with his time-bending Disney+ show.

Tom Hiddleston is Loki, and he is burdened with glorious purpose: After playing Thor's puckish brother for over a decade in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, no one understands the mercurial Asgardian God of Mischief as well as the actor. He can teach an entire seminar on Loki if given the opportunity — which he actually did during pre-production on his forthcoming Disney+ show. In conversation, Hiddleston quotes lines from his MCU debut, 2011's Thor, almost verbatim, and will playfully correct you if you mistakenly refer to Asgard's Rainbow Bridge as the Bifrost, which is the portal that connects Loki and Thor's homeworld to the Nine Realms, including Midgard, a.k.a. Earth. "Well, the Bifrost technically is the energy that runs through the bridge," he says with a smile. "But nine points to Gryffindor!" And when he shows up to the photo shoot for this very digital cover, he hops on a call with our photo editor to pitch ways the concept could be even more Loki, like incorporating the flourish the trickster does whenever magically conjuring something. The lasting impression is that playing Loki isn't just a paycheck.

"Rather than ownership, it's a sense of responsibility I feel to give my best every time and do the best I can because I feel so grateful to be a part of what Marvel Studios has created," the 40-year-old Brit tells EW over Zoom a few days after the shoot and a week out from Thor's 10th anniversary. "I just want to make sure I've honored that responsibility with the best that I can give and the most care and thought and energy."

After appearing in three Thor movies and three Avengers, Hiddleston is bringing that passion to his first solo Marvel project, Loki, the House of Ideas' third Disney+ series following the sitcom pastiche WandaVision and the topical The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Led by head writer Michael Waldron (Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Heels), the six-episode drama sees Hiddleston's shapeshifting agent of chaos step out from behind his brother's shadow and into the spotlight for a timey-wimey, sci-fi adventure that aims to get to the bottom of who Loki really is. "I wanted to explore slightly more complex character questions," says Waldron. "It's not just good versus bad. Is anybody all good? Is anybody all bad? What makes a hero, a hero? A villain, a villain?"  

Even though Loki — who loves sowing mayhem with his illusion magic and shapeshifting, all with a major chip on his shoulder — has never been one for introspection, the idea of building an entire show around him was a no-brainer for Marvel. When asked why Loki was one of the studio's first Disney+ shows, Marvel president Kevin Feige replies matter-of-factly, "More Hiddleston, more Loki." First introduced as Thor's (Chris Hemsworth) envious brother in Kenneth Branagh's Thor, Loki went full Big Bad in 2012's The Avengers. That film cemented the impish rogue as one of the shared universe's fan favorites, thanks to Hiddleston's ability to make him deliciously villainous yet charismatic and, most importantly, empathetic. The character's popularity is one of the reasons he's managed to avoid death many times.

"He's been around for thousands of years. He had all sorts of adventures," says Feige. "Wanting to fill in the blanks and see much more of Loki's story [was] the initial desire [for the series]."

The Loki we meet on the show is not the one who fought the Avengers in 2012 and evolved into an antihero in Thor: The Dark World and Thor: Ragnarok before meeting his demise at the hands of the mad titan Thanos (Josh Brolin) in 2018's Avengers: Infinity War. Instead, we'll be following a Loki from a branched timeline (a variant, if you will) after he stole the Tesseract following his thwarted New York invasion and escaped S.H.I.E.L.D. custody during the time heist featured in Avengers: Endgame. In other words, this Loki hasn't gone through any sort of redemption arc. He's still the charming yet petulant god who firmly believes he's destined to rule and has never gotten his due.

Premiering June 9, Loki begins with the Time Variance Authority — a bureaucratic organization tasked with safeguarding the proper flow of time — arresting the Loki Variant seen in Endgame because they want his help fixing all of the timeline problems he caused while on the run with the Tesseract. So there will be time travel, and a lot more of it than in Endgame. As Loki makes his way through his own procedural, he'll match wits with new characters including Owen Wilson's Agent Mobius, a brilliant TVA analyst, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw's Judge Renslayer. The question in early episodes is whether Loki will help them or take over.

"One of the things Kevin Feige led on was, 'I think we should find a way of exploring the parts of Loki that are independent of his relationship with Thor,' or see him in a duality or in relationship with others, which I thought was very exciting," says Hiddleston, who also serves as an executive producer on the show. "So the Odinson saga, that trilogy of films, still has its integrity, and we don't have to reopen it and retell it."

Yet, in order to understand where Loki is going, it's important to see where he came from.

Hiddleston can't believe how long he and Loki have been connected. "I've been playing this character for 11 years," he says. "Which is the first time I have said that sentence, I realize, and it [blows] my mind. I don't know what percentage that is exactly of my 40 years of being alive, but it's substantial."

His time as Loki actually goes a bit further back, to 2009 — a year after Robert Downey Jr. big banged the MCU into existence with Iron Man — when he auditioned for Thor. It's no secret that Hiddleston initially went in for the role of the titular God of Thunder, but Feige and director Kenneth Branagh thought his natural charm and flexibility as an actor made him better suited for the movie's damaged antagonist. "Tom gave you an impression that he could be ready for anything, performance-wise," says Branagh, who had previously worked with him on a West End revival of Checkov's Ivanov and the BBC series Wallander. "Tom has a wild imagination, so does Loki. He's got a mischievous sense of humor and he was ready to play. It felt like he had a star personality, but he was a team player."

Hiddleston fully immersed himself in the character. Outside of studying Loki's history in the Marvel Comics, he also researched how Loki and the Trickster God archetype appeared across mythology and different cultures. "He understood that he was already in something special [and] it was a special character in a special part of that early moment in the life of the Marvel universe where [he] also needed to step up in other ways," says Branagh, who was impressed by the emotional depth Hiddleston brought to the part, especially when it came to how isolated Loki felt in the Asgardian royal family.  

There was a lot riding on that first Thor feature. For one, no one knew if audiences would immediately latch onto a Shakespearean superhero movie partially set on an alien planet populated by the Norse Gods of legend. Second, it was integral to Feige's plans for the shared universe. Loki was supposed to be the main villain in The Avengers, which would not only mirror how Earth's mightiest heroes joined forces in 1963's Avengers #1 but also give Thor a believable reason for teaming up with Iron Man, Captain America (Chris Evans), and the rest of the capes. Feige first clued Hiddleston into those larger plans when the actor was in L.A. before Thor started shooting.

"I was like, 'Excuse me?' Because he was already three, four steps ahead," says Hiddleston. "That took me a few minutes to process, because I didn't quite realize how it just suddenly had a scope. And being cast as Loki, I realized, was a very significant moment for me in my life, and was going to remain. The creative journey was going to be so exciting."

Hiddleston relished the opportunity to go full villain in Avengers, like in the scene where Loki ordered a crowd to kneel before him outside a German opera house: "It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation," says the Machiavellian god. "The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel."

"I just knew that in the structure of that film, I had to lean into his role as a pure antagonist," Hiddleston recalls. "What I always found curious and complex about the way Loki is written in Avengers, is that his status as an antagonist comes from the same well of not belonging and being marginalized and isolated in the first Thor film. Loki now knows he has no place in Asgard."

Loki did find a place within the audience's hearts, though. Feige was "all in" on Hiddleston as his Loki from the beginning, but even he couldn't predict how much fans would love him. Feige recalls the reaction at the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con: "Did we know that after he was the villain in two movies, he would be bringing thousands of people to their feet in Hall H, in costume, chanting his name? No, that was above and beyond the plan that we were hoping for and dreaming of." It was a dream Feige first got an inkling of a year earlier during the Avengers press tour when a Russian fan slipped past security, snuck into Mark Ruffalo's car, and asked the Hulk actor to give Hiddleston a piece of fan art she created. "That was one of the early signs there was much more happening with this quote-unquote villain."  

Despite that popularity, the plan was to kill Loki off in 2013's Thor: The Dark World, but the studio reversed course after test audiences refused to believe he actually died fighting the Dark Elves. Alas, he couldn't out-illusion death forever. After returning in Taika Waititi's colorful and idiosyncratic Thor: Ragnarok, Hiddleston's character perished for real in the opening moments of Infinity War. In typical Loki fashion, before Thanos crushed his windpipe, he delivered a defiant speech that indicated he'd finally made peace with the anger he felt toward his family.  

"It felt very, very final, and I thought, 'Okay, that's it. This is Loki's final bow and a conclusive end to the Odinson saga,'" says Hiddleston, who shot that well-earned death scene in 2017.  

But, though he didn't know it yet, the actor's MCU story was far from over.

Credit: Charlie Gray for EW

When Hiddleston returned to film two scenes in Avengers: Endgame in 2017, he had no idea where Loki portaled off to after snatching the Tesseract. "Where'd he go? When does he go? How does he get there? These are all questions I remember asking on the day, and then not being given any answers," Hiddleston recalls. To be fair, it's likely the Powers That Be didn't necessarily have answers then. While Feige can't exactly recall when the writers' room for Endgame first devised Loki's escape sequence, he does know that setting up a future show wasn't the primary goal — because a Loki series wasn't on the horizon just yet.

"[That scene] was really more of a wrinkle so that one of the missions that the Avengers went on in Endgame could get screwed up and not go well, which is what required Cap and Tony to go further back in time to the '70s," says Feige. Soon after that, though, former Disney CEO Bob Iger approached Feige about producing content for the studio's forthcoming streaming service. "I think the notion that we had left this hanging loose end with Loki gave us the in for what a Loki series could be. So by the time [Endgame] came out, we did know where it was going."

As for Hiddleston, he didn't find out about the plans for a Loki show until spring 2018, a few weeks before Infinity War hit theaters. "I probably should not have been surprised, but I was," says the actor. "But only because Infinity War had felt so final."

Nevertheless, Hiddleston was excited about returning for his show. He was eager to explore Loki's powers, especially the shapeshifting, and what it meant that this disruptive figure still managed to find a seat beside the gods in mythology. "I love this idea [of] Loki's chaotic energy somehow being something we need. Even though, for all sorts of reasons, you don't know whether you can trust him. You don't know whether he's going to betray you. You don't why he's doing what he's doing," says Hiddleston. "If he's shapeshifting so often, does he even know who he is? And is he even interested in understanding who he is? Underneath all those masks, underneath the charm and the wit, which is kind of a defense anyway, does Loki have an authentic self? Is he introspective enough or brave enough to find out? I think all of those ideas are all in the series — ideas about identity, ideas about self-knowledge, self-acceptance, and the difficulty of it."

“The series will explore Loki's powers in a way they have not yet been explored, which is very, very exciting.”

The thing that truly sold Hiddleston on the show was Marvel's decision to include the Time Variance Authority, a move he describes as "the best idea that anybody had pertaining to the series." Feige and Loki executive producer Stephen Broussard had hoped to find a place for the TVA — an organization that debuted in 1986's Thor #372 and has appeared in She-Hulk and Fantastic Four stories — in the MCU for years, but the right opportunity never presented itself until Loki came along. "Putting Loki into his own procedural series became the eureka moment for the show," says Feige.  

The TVA's perspective on time and reality also tied into the themes that Waldron, Loki's head writer, was hoping to explore. "Loki is a character that's always reckoning with his own identity, and the TVA, by virtue of what they do, is uniquely suited to hold up a mirror to Loki and make him really confront who he is and who he was supposed to be," says Waldron. Hiddleston adds: "[That] was very exciting because in the other films, there was always something about Loki that was very controlled. He seemed to know exactly what the cards in his hand were and how he was going to play them…. And Loki versus the TVA is Loki out of control immediately, and in an environment in which he's completely behind the pace, out of his comfort zone, destabilized, and acting out."

To truly dig into who Loki is, the creative team had to learn from the man who knows him best: Hiddleston. "I got him to do a thing called Loki School when we first started," says director Kate Herron. "I asked him to basically talk through his 10 years of the MCU — from costumes to stunts, to emotionally how he felt in each movie. It was fantastic."

Hiddleston got something out of the Loki school, too. Owen Wilson both attended the class and interviewed Hiddleston afterward so that he could better understand Loki, as his character Mobius is supposed to be an expert on him. During their conversation, Wilson pointedly asked Hiddleston what he loved about playing the character.

"And I said, 'I think it's because he has so much range,'" says Hiddleston. "I remember saying this to him: 'On the 88 keys on the piano, he can play the twinkly light keys at the top. He can keep it witty and light, and he's the God of Mischief, but he can also go down to the other side and play the heavy keys. And he can play some really profound chords down there, which are about grief and betrayal and loss and heartbreak and jealousy and pride.'" Hiddleston recalls Wilson being moved by the description: "He said, 'I think I might say that in the show.' And it was such a brilliant insight for me into how open Owen is as an artist and a performer.'"

Owen Wilson as Mobius and Tom Hiddleston as Loki in 'Loki.'| Credit: Chuck Zlotnick/Marvel Studios

Everyone involved is particularly excited for audiences to see Hiddleston and Wilson's on-screen chemistry. "Mobius is not unlike Owen Wilson in that he's sort of nonplussed by the MCU," says Feige. "[Loki] is used to getting a reaction out of people, whether it's his brother or his father, or the other Avengers. He likes to be very flamboyant and theatrical. Mobius doesn't give him the reaction he's looking for. That leads to a very unique relationship that Loki's not used to."

As for the rest of the series, we know that Loki will be jumping around time and reality, but the creative team isn't keen on revealing when and where. "Every episode, we tried to take inspiration from different things," says Waldron, citing Blade Runner's noir aesthetic as one example.

"Part of the fun of the multiverse and playing with time is seeing other versions of characters, and other versions of the titular character in particular," says Feige, who also declined to confirm if Loki ties into Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and/or other upcoming projects.

Making Loki was especially meaningful to Hiddleston because they shot most of it during the pandemic, in late 2020. "It will remain one of the absolute most intense, most rewarding experiences of my life," he says. "It's a series about time, and the value of time, and what time is worth, and I suppose what the experience of being alive is worth. And I don't quite know yet, and maybe I don't have perspective on it, if all the thinking and the reflecting that we did during the lockdown ended up in the series. But in some way, it must have because everything we make is a snapshot of where we were in our lives at that time."

While it remains to be seen what the future holds for Loki beyond this initial season, Hiddleston isn't preparing to put the character to bed yet. "I'm open to everything," he says. "I have said goodbye to the character. I've said hello to the character. I said goodbye to the character [again]. I've learned not to make assumptions, I suppose. I'm just grateful that I'm still here, and there are still new roads to explore."

[greysfall]

My two cents on the TWEWY anime

Like I said in my last post, the TWEWY Animation is something better to have happened than not, and there are couples of good things about it too. In terms of production quality, I would consider it a low-budget anime. It serves the purpose of laying out the story in anime narrative, some characters get more screentime and get fleshed out a lot more (Eri, 777). Def March and Sota & Nao got revived, some scenes were nice… etc. The good things tho, cannot make up for some bigger issues of the anime, namely:

1.      Anime Josh is inaccurately designed and portrayed

As fans, you can draw and interpret a character however way you wish but as professionals who work on official materials, it’s hugely disappointing how they get none of Josh’s trademark features or expressions right. I have no business offending anyone who enjoys the anime, nothing wrong with that. I’m just commenting from the standpoint of an artist who has worked on professional levels, and as a Josh fanartist who has spent many, many hours studying his features and drawing Josh with a sense of faithfulness to the core of his character. Also as a Josh fan, this problem hit me pretty hard. 

(On the left: Joshua Kiryu. On the right: generic base model with a cheap wig)

Sure, the anime is low-budget and heavily based on 3D model perhaps, but I HAVE PROOFS IT CAN BE BETTER. I see no problem in simplifying details to make it easier to animate, the anime palette and art style is decent enough. HOWEVER, it’s the DESIGN. It’s the sloppily put together design that can ruin a character. Now it’s not a matter of different art styles, since I have tried fixing several scenes in the anime to make Josh look more like… Josh, with almost the same level of detail. Yea, it still looks a lot like my own art style but I studied the original design very carefully to fuse it with the anime model and palette.

(All original frames will be on the left and my fixed frames on the right)

Let me break it to you: Josh has a simplistic design but a very complex personality that is subtly hinted beneath his facial features and expressions. Nomura has the habit to draw characters quite similarly (with slightly droopy eyes) from the 2/3 or ¾ angle, but he does design them all to look different if you look closely enough.

Original Nomura sketch

Firstly the facial features. Nomura always draws Josh with sharp features: sharp eyes, brows, lashes, nose, mouth, everything. Josh’s front angle for example, clearly shows that he has really sharp eyes and distinctly smaller irises than say, Neku or Shiki. 

Iris size and eyes shape comparison

His eyes are supposed to show a mix of mischief and wit, and outright so – not hidden at all. Anime Josh’s eyes always look like he’s either blank, faking innocence or is sleepy.

Anime Josh and the “faking innocence” or “smiley eyes” expressions that were never seen in the original.

We all know about Josh’s infamous hairstyle, but ya know whenever I draw Josh, I draw the face without any hair first to make sure the eyes and brows carry his vibe. The anime screwed that up by giving him the same iris size as the other kids, his brows always look flat or downward and not straight up like in the original game design. Also my friends pointed out that his brows are not drawn in black lines like his original ones (Neku and Shiki are both given black brows) making every expression a tad duller.

Now comes the infamous hair, the shape and placement and size of the bang is everything. It’s tricky cuz Josh’s bang would look like a 3:7 ratio from the side or 5:5 from the front angle. Most of the time, anime Josh’s bang obscures too much of his forehead due to bigger bang size and wrong placement.

Compare: smaller forehead space can really change a face

If the character designer doesn’t get the face and the hair right, they get nothing about Josh. Why? Because it’s closely related to his characterization.

In terms of characterization, it felt pretty off most of the time. Game Josh is much snarkier and sassier, nonetheless more righteous (his name literally means Justice plus his role as a spiritual ruler). Meanwhile anime Josh is just pretentious. Game Josh never cares to hide his mischief, just getting his way around the truth. He never even talks much about himself and only explains the most vital key points, therefore he was able to create a maze of doubt and confusion surrounding his existence, making his character so compelling to in-game characters and likewise fans. Anime Josh lacks the charm due to downplaying all of that, as Composer he even had to explain everything himself at the end – kinda lame, to be honest.

Josh was pretty amused when Neky found out about CAT’s identity and the anime saw no importance in that (up: original frame, down: edited frame). 

More importantly, anime Josh’s expression sheet is composed of mostly non-existent emotions for Josh and seems to be designed by someone who has never played TWEWY and only guessed what he’s like based on characters of similar tropes. A good designer should never read characters based on tropes. The thing is, the original anime concept design looks like it’s done by someone who has a much better grasp of Josh visually. 

What the hell happened between the two?  

Granted that anime Josh is based on Kobayashi Gen’s design instead of Nomura’s, and Gen himself does seem to struggle a lot with drawing Josh because his drawings rarely come out right. Gen did try at some points and did a decent job, features or vibe – he would at least try to get one of those right on important occasions. However, the anime character designer just did a tropy, generalized design as the model and Josh in the ENTIRE anime was based on that. Why? They could have always made it better and truer. They simply never did.

This Gen’s Josh is alright.

This Gen’s Josh is an utter tragedy.

This sketch shows Josh’s face in Gen’s memories, a bubble of undefined smugness. No wonder it wasn’t Nomura who drew “Yoshiya” in A New Day. The job was definitely assigned to someone who never gets Josh right from the first place.

Look at the ending and promo art for TWEWY done by Ilya Kuvshinov. They’re a commission artist and their work shows clear research and effort in portraying every character correctly, even when fused with their personal style. That’s an artist taking their job seriously, the anime character designer sure isn’t.

The same thing happened to Sho. Sho was also given a good concept design at the beginning and suffers from the same design generalization later. He never even got to chant Pi so really, what was even the deal? Are these interesting characters too much to be portrayed correctly? Are they above what the anime makers find comprehensible? Whatever the case, I don’t think it’s worth it.

2.      The ultimately worst scene in The Animation is probably the final gun showdown between Neku and Joshua

Neku dropping his gun and smiling while saying “I trust you” is super cringy and out of character and illogical, as it somehow throws away all of his anger and frustration at that moment which makes the burden of his decision so obvious and relatable in the original. This is such a huge shame, cuz Neku’s been nicely portrayed for most of the anime series. The whole point of that scene was not Neku calming down to rely it all on “trust”, but about whether he could choose to NOT shoot Josh even at the highest point of his pain and emotions, despite all the s.hit that’s happening to face Josh with everything on the line, thus resulting in his final victory. 

He just did not wanna shoot Josh, but also did NOT drop his gun in the original scene because I’m sure if Josh redirects the gun to Shiki or Beat instead, the outcome would have been different. Neku is not the naïve and trusting person the anime decided for him to be, he grew up to trust and listen, but he’ll always have a good sense of critical thinking.

So to conclude this essay, here are the original frames and my fixed frames put together side by side - with help from a friend @areiml​ who shares my opinion for row 4 and 6.

Full size: https://im.ge/i/dDAk9