#legitimately i think this video is going to be fucking awesome

[lesbianpikachu]

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[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

pez dispenser update, yay!

I am Very Interested in the direction you're taking izuku here. He seems to have come out the other side of this breakdown going, "no look! I trust you guys! Here, I trust you guys so much! You can know about the severe injuries I had as a child that never got a police report!"

It's funny to read izuku's pov vs aizawa. Izuku is just like, wow this all needs to end so I can get back to being the Normal And Awesome Deku I have turned myself into, and aizawa is like thirty seconds from having his own panic attack at having a few months to turn this kid into a functional human being.

You can truly tell that with how izuku keeps insisting on that he's got this by himself, with no understanding how crazy it is to expect his friends and teachers to back out and let him take over, that he, still, still, STILL has simply 0 faith or expectation that his teacher is driven to help the little kid in izuku that he's buried so deep down there. That an authority figure who isn't all might wants to save him. I want to eat his unthinking, warped by trauma thought patterns, they are delicious.

Kinda touching that midoriya foresaw and tried to avert the all might conversation issue. Rip, dude really tried, but baby izuku is like one of those puddles in flooded old buildings you can find videos of people dropping a rock in -- it doesn't look that deep, but if you tried to put your foot in, you would be getting a whole lot more than your shoe wet.

Yeahhhhhh Izuku’s really not handling it the best.

Izuku genuinely didn’t keep everything a secret all these years because he didn’t trust his friends. It wasn’t that he thought they’d react poorly or hurt him with the information or spread it around or anything like that. This was purely due to his own internal issues around it.

But they’re three years deep into being in the fucking trenches together. And Izuku very much is considered a bedrock of the class. You can see it in their internal monologues—everyone trusts him implicitly. It’s Izuku. If one of them was going through something sensitive or painful, he’d be at the top of the list of people to turn to. For like, the entire class.

And while Izuku isn’t per se aware of the fact that the entire class views him as the best of them, he is painfully aware of the fact that they’ve opened up to him over the years. And that this is making it look like he didn’t tell them a single detail about his life before he came to the school. Which is fair, because he sort of didn’t.

So he’s overcompensating. He doesn’t need privacy because he trusts them so so much and this proves it, right?? They can totally know the sordid details of the past he’s in active crisis over.

He’s scared that he’s going to lose the people who have trusted him over the years because he seemingly didn’t trust them back. But they all trust him so much that they’re more beating themselves up than blaming him.

Todoroki and Mirio were in that scene like “uuuuhhhh you look like you’re a second from a panic attack we can totally give you space if it makes you more comfortable” and Izuku’s in a spiral like Why Would I Need Space I Trust You Both Implicitly Please Ignore The Obvious Distress.

Fundamentally, Izuku has never processed what happened to him as a kid. He didn’t tell them because he wasn’t ready to confront how bad it was back then. It wasn’t about trust. Telling them meant saying aloud what happened. He just wasn’t ready for that.

And from the path canon took, I don’t really see Izuku trusting adults. His childhood did absolutely nothing to make him think teachers would protect him. And for all Aizawa did right, I think this is one bag in canon he legitimately dropped.

I want to be clear—Aizawa was working at a severe disadvantage. He didn’t even have a lot to tell him the problem existed, let alone how to address it. But it’s specifically the Hero Killer Stain Arc that makes me think that Izuku only would trust Aizawa to a certain point.

After the Hero Killer Stain Arc, Aizawa canonically calls out Iida, Todoroki, and Izuku in front of the entire class. He doesn’t mention what it's about, but he makes it very clear that he knows what happened and that he disapproves. And his criticism is specific: In instances where you are out matched, it is better to run and get help. Iida, Midoriya, and Todoroki need to understand that

The thing is that Izuku and Todoroki both considered that as their first option and then correctly deduced that they'd be burying Iida if they did that.

I will actually die on the hill that is that Izuku and Todoroki did everything right when it came to the Hero Killer Stain. Iida caused the problem, but the fact that he made mistakes was the point of that arc for him. But Izuku and Todoroki?

They both reacted perfectly. And if they had done a single thing differently, they'd have two dead bodies.

When Izuku realizes that Iida's in danger, the city is on fire, Nomu are attacking the train, and his supervisor has fucked off to fight monsters attacking the city. He does not have an adult hero who is free to bring with him, and we know for a fact that he did not have time to hesitate or try to find other options, because he arrives the second before Iida dies as-is. When he's on scene, his absolute first instinct is to run. Izuku canonically clocked the fact that he was out matched, evaluated whether he could safely retreat, and realized he’d never be able to get out of there with Iida and Native. He’d have to leave one or both of them to die.

So he asked for help the safest way he could: sending out the mass text and stalling for time. And canonically, he wasn’t hoping a classmate would show up to the fight. He was hoping they’d report it to their supervisors and get him help, which is exactly what multiple of his classmates did.

Todoroki, for his part, correctly clocked that something was wrong with Izuku when he got the message. And he didn’t just fuck off without telling anyone where he was going. He evaluated the situation, realized the city was on fucking fire and there wasn’t a single hero free to go with them, and told the heroes with him that they needed to go to this exact location the first second they could. And he didn’t have a moment to hesitate or figure something else out, because he also showed up at the very last second before Iida took a sword to his spine.

Frankly, Todoroki and Izuku couldn’t have possibly handled the situation better, but they got absolutely shit on in the aftermath. I don’t recall a single adult who told them they did the right thing, except maybe Native. They had the fucking chief of police telling them they were no better than the guy who tried to kill their teenage friend with a sword and their teacher publicly calling them out in front of the class without the benefit of context.

If I was Izuku, I would have walked out of that entire thing having my preexisting distrust of adults affirmed. Like. There isn’t a world where Izuku realistically looks back on his actions and thinks “damn I really should have left Iida die.” He’s not going to change a fucking thing in what he did. Every single time, he’s going to go save his friend. The only realistic take away Izuku could have from Aizawa’s call out was “wow, that guy is not going to have my back if I have to make a tough call. So if I have to make one, then I’m just not going to him for help.”

Which is kind of where we're at in pez right now, and Aizawa's starting to realize it. Don't get me wrong, Izuku trusts Aizawa more than any teacher he ever had growing up. He doesn't think Aizawa is going to be actively malicious to him. But he also doesn't necessarily think Aizawa's going to have his back.

The crux of it is in chapter 4. Tiny Izuku says that Mr. Aizawa is already on Izuku's side, and Izuku's immediate reply is, "I promise you that Mr. Aizawa has never once been on my side." He back pedals fast, clarifies that he thinks Mr. Aizawa is fair and not on anyone's side, but his knee-jerk reaction is undeniable.

And to me? It's because Aizawa genuinely has not been on Izuku's side since he came to UA. And I don't mean Aizawa has been malicious to Izuku. Fundamentally, the issue is that he misdiagnosed the problem.

Aizawa has spent his entire time with Izuku mistakenly believing that the source of Izuku's issues was the same as Bakugou's. He is only now realizing that his issues were more like Shinsou's.

Fundamentally, Aizawa correctly recognized that Izuku's problems came from the fact that he was raised in an unjust system. But he misunderstood what Izuku's position in it was.

Here's what Aizawa knows, from the jump: Izuku and Bakugou came from the same school. Both have very powerful Quirks. Both have obvious issues with the other. Izuku specifically moves and looks like he had a professional trainer, meaning someone invested in his training as a hero. Bakugou talks like someone who's been told his entire life that the sun shines out his ass and never got punished for being a little shit. Izuku's more muted, but he came from the same school. Two kids with powerful quirks? Likely were getting away with the exact same shit.

When you have an unjust system, you have the people running it, the people benefitting from it, and the people being victimized by it. If the teachers at Aldera were letting kids with powerful quirks get away with murder, both Izuku and Bakugou were likely benefitting from that. And it is absolutely vital that Aizawa undoes that damage before they debut.

He doesn't even need to think Izuku, specifically, was abusing his position in this power imbalance. The damage is done from how the teachers at aldera were likely treating him. Teachers that produce kids like Bakugou tell talented, powerful kids that they're special, that they're above the rules, that they've got something so fundamentally important about them that they can get away with more. Even if you don't chose to abuse that narrative in the moment, that's a hell of a formative experience.

They're about to have a ridiculous amount of power. They are about to be in charge of enforcing the rules. And people who are in charge of enforcing the rules and think they're above them turn into Endeavor.

Aizawa's approached Izuku from a sort of tough love perspective from the jump. He didn't cut him an ounce of slack, and it's because he genuinely was trying to do right by Izuku. No, he's not going to get to smash up his body and make himself a hazard. Figure it out, or go home.

He's had plenty of time to learn how to manage his quirk, after all.

With Stain? I don't think Aizawa, if he knew the full circumstances, would genuinely say the right call is to have Iida's fucking funeral. I think he'd agree with the decisions Izuku and todoroki made. But he didn't have all the information, and, fatally, he didn't ask. He assumed.

He's got three powerful, bullheaded students who end up in a back alley in the middle of the night, having all separately ditched the heroes they were supposed to be joined at the fucking hip with. He absolutely thinks that they either planned it together or that, when they realized what Iida did, Todoroki and Iida went after him in secret to try to keep Iida from getting in trouble--and almost got them all killed in the process. There is absolutely no way Aizawa knows that they actually tried to run and get help at every turn.

Aizawa made assumptions. And a big reason why he felt comfortable making those assumptions was because he thought he knew what Izuku's problem was. He thought Izuku, like Bakugou, had been benefitting from teachers turning a blind eye to his misbehavior for years. But the problem was the exact opposite. Teachers had been turning a blind eye to his victimization for years.

He shouldn't have been treating him like Bakugou. He should have been treating him like Shinsou.

Aizawa's trying to correct the damage of past teachers. If they've spent years telling Izuku he's god's gift to mankind and it doesn't matter what he does because he's a hero and that makes up for it, Aizawa needs to hold him to the fucking rules. He needs him to understand that he's not special, he's not the main character, he's not intrinsically better or more important or above the rules in some magically important way. He doesn't want to hear excuses. He doesn't want to know why this time it was different. Izuku needs to understand that he has to live by the rules too, because he's going to be in charge of enforcing them soon.

But if they've spent years telling him he's worthless, that people can hurt him and it's okay, that he can never, ever expect help from them because he's not worth it? Then fuck, Aizawa needed to do the opposite. He needed the same end result, don't get me wrong--an understanding that the system equally applies to everyone--but he needs to make Izuku believe that the system will protect him again. That Aizawa will protect him. And Aizawa's combing over every fucking interaction they've ever had, and realizing that he hasn't done that, because he spent all his time trying to correct a problem that didn't exist.

I think Aizawa's been beating his head against the problem that is Midoriya Izuku for the past three years. Because Izuku's a hard-worker. He is brilliant. He is a natural leader. He is the fucking cornerstone of the class. He is shining so bright that it's going to kill him, because Aizawa knows how to recognize a star that's burning out.

For three years, Aizawa has tried and failed to get Izuku to realize he can and should ask for help. And he has failed because he thought the problem was that Izuku didn't think he needed help, when the problem was actually that he thought no one would give it to him.

In this last chapter, Izuku finally said aloud the reason behind the core issue Aizawa’s had with him his entire time at UA: Growing up, he thought that there was literally one man on the planet who would care enough to save him. He was the most hero-obsessed boy Aizawa’s ever met, and he thought All Might was the only hero alive he could count on to care if he lived or died.

There it is. The exact answer about every scrap of self destructive behavior that Aizawa’s been trying and failing to remedy for years. Why the fuck would he ask for help when he needs it? He’s spent his entire life living in a world where people wouldn’t piss on him if he were on fire. Aizawa needed every day of those three years to reverse that kind of damage, and he’s out of fucking time.

Aizawa is legitimately terrified that he fucked up and that it's going to kill Izuku.

Izuku’s Quirklessness is the missing piece of the puzzle that makes everything fall into place—which is why he’s so pissed at All Might for not telling him. Aizawa’s actually kicking himself for not noticing the obvious discrepancies in Izuku’s past. The fact that he grew up with a powerful Quirk was the factor that made him return to the same incorrect conclusion again and again. There were enough hints that he feels guilty for not figuring it out anyway, but if he had known about Izuku’s Quirklessness from the start? He would have figured it out in seconds.

Now that he knows, Aizawa’s changed how he handles Izuku. He doesn’t let there be a single doubt about what he’s doing or why. He makes Izuku explain himself, so that way there’s no more miscommunications around what he means. He makes sure to compliment him whenever he does something right—he’s trying to change courses, but he’s panicking that it’s too little, too late.

And now he’s got this goddamn criminal investigation that Izuku wants to bury, and it’s killing him. Because that’s his student, and he was hurt horribly. And his student just cannot comprehend why Aizawa cannot let it go.

And then there’s All Might.

All Might’s conversation with baby Izuku, for me, forecloses the possibility that explaining OfA is a solution here.

All Might really went in and knocked it out of the park with the best possible attempt at convincing Tiny Izuku that he’s himself. He immediately failed, albeit, but he honestly couldn’t have done better.

There he is, Izuku’s lifelong hero. And he’s there to say the things Izuku’s spent his whole life wanting to hear. All Might met him, and Izuku inspired him. He reminded him of himself when he was young. He thought he could be a hero. He was so impressed he offered to personally mentor Izuku.

And he loved him. Believe you are him, because I loved you too much to ever let anyone take you from me. There is a fundamental flaw in your theory that simply no one cared enough to notice or stop him, because I love you with all of me. I would have noticed. I would have saved you.

If there is absolutely anything that could have convinced Tiny Izuku, it would be that. This isn’t about quality of the explanation. There’s an internal issue that needs to be fixed before Tiny Izuku will believe any of this.

And I think Izuku recognizes this, on a level. As much as he and Tiny Izuku clash, Izuku gets him. He can typically predict Tiny Izuku’s exact responses to things.

But he’s never approached Tiny Izuku like someone he can explain this to. He’s spent this entire time trying to cheat code his way out of this situation. He wants Mr. Aizawa to erase him or to go find the Quirk user and find away to negate the Quirk. He’s never actually even considered explaining this all to himself as a solution.

Because he knows that there’s some kind of fundamental impossibility about it. Even if he can’t say exactly what it is, he knows that there’s an internal issue that means he’s not going to be able to just tell Tiny Izuku the truth.

Voice of God, he is dead fucking right about Tiny Izuku not buying OfA and being liable to tell everyone out of spite. Tiny Izuku would have that shit on the news.

Fundamentally, Izuku is aware that there is a deeper problem driving Tiny Izuku. He knows that it’s not about the quality of the explanation. There is something deeply, profoundly wrong because of what happened to him that makes him absolutely unable to accept that Izuku is him.

But Izuku has never known how to solve the mental wounds his childhood left him with. He still has them himself. He’s been burying them for years, and he can’t anymore.

When action opens in pez, Izuku himself is not okay. He’s just… bleeding internally. He knows how to hurt in ways people can’t see. But you can see how much his childhood is still bothering him in his defense of Mirio. He has never been able to let go of what happened to him. The wounds never healed.

And he doesn’t know how to go to these people he loves and tell them that what they’re trying fundamentally will fail, because he knows he’s been hiding this fucking shipwreck of his own mental health for the past three years but they don’t have a fucking clue at the scale of the problem.

At the end of the day, All Might went in there because he wanted to save Izuku. And Izuku told him not to because he cannot imagine himself being saved.

[kaija-rayne-author]

OMG I'm laughing so hard at someone calling me names because I dared post that I had to unfollow people who were toxicly positive about Veilguard and being twats about it to others.

Again, I'm truly happy for you if you liked it. I didn't. You shockingly don't have to be an asshole to others about it. Nor do you need to shit on something other people loved simply because checks notes, some stranger on the internet said that they didn't want to follow people being toxically positive about something you liked. Oooookay then. 🤣

It's a video game. A piece of entertainment. It's fiction.

If you get so worked up over someone else's (a strangers!) opinion that you're slinging ad hominem attacks, maaaaaybe it's time to I dunno, do literally anything else?

Especially trying to get any response but laughter or blocking out of someone like me who has lived through so much that if I talk about even a fraction of it, people go all owl eyed and universally ask in a quiet, shocked tone 'how are you even alive?'

Legit can't stop laughing. 🤣

Update

So, I freely admit that I'm in a bad mood and broke my rule about feeding the trolls. I shall do my due internet denizen duty and block/report.

In all responsibility, while laughing at a troll can be a good tool, it risks escalation, and it's really better to simply block and report. They get their jollies by making people feel horrible. (I wasn’t laughing out of trying to feed a troll BTW. They legitimately shocked me into laughing. I wasn't in a good enough mood to hide my reaction.)

They've either deleted or hidden their responses to me. It's just a crying shame that screenshots are forever. Y'all might want to preemptively block. Up to you.

If they hadn’t been so utterly awful, I'd probably have let it slide. But this behavior is unacceptable in a society.

Transcript since it won't fit in alt text.

Lilithfairen

So you're just a raging asshole who can't stand people enjoying a game you didn't. You should let people know that when you follow them so anyone with common sense can block you the moment they see you around.

Masked responder

That's not what OP said lmao

Me

Oh, honey. You're precious (laugh emoji) Go try to gaslight and sea lion someone else. In your vast amounts of time where you're not being a dick to a stranger, perhaps you should consider brushing up on that 'reading comprehension' thing. I gather it's not your highest skill. Maybe put a few skill points in that.

Me replying to masked responder

Right? (Laugh emoji) Just posting on my own wall, about a Fandom problem that they very clearly demonstrated an excellent example of, and *I'm* the asshole. I'm laughing so fucking hard I'm almost crying.

lilithfairen

Oh, not gaslighting anyone. Because a quick check tells me you're a BG3 stan, which highlights why you don't like Veilguard and the people who enjoy it. Veilguard doesn't write queer people as sexual predator. Veilguard doesn't get off on victimizing non-white people or writing them as innately evil and savage. Veilguard doesn't write a storyline where a goddess is a prop to paint a white guy as awesome and smart and then written as a horrible bitch herself. You're a garbage shitstain of a person who can't stand Veilguard not being a game written for straight white manbaby sensibilities, because you think that's what good fiction is.

Me. Oh, do please keep responding (laugh emoji) you're amusing me and exposing your ignorance nicely. Have you considered therapy? It might help with that whole ... hatred of everyone who isn't me... thing, you have going on. I actually can't stop laughing at the loads of shit you're shoveling. I hope you're getting a decent wage for that. Shoveling shit is hard work.

I did say I wasn't in a good mood.

Anyway... because I'm me... pretty sure a lot of people who play Dragon Age games also play BG3. And liked both. It's not an either or. People can shockingly like both! While accepting that there's no such thing as a perfect game/book/movie/show/anything.

I know several people I'm on good terms with who absolutely loved Veilguard. I didn't, but it's not their problem. I don't make it their problem.

Veilguard doesn't write queer people well. Period. (I'm a queer AF author and editor.)

"Doesn't get off on victimizing non-white people or writing them as innately evil and savage." *blinks*. 'Who do we put across from Harding for a death choice. "Assan."' -John Epler (Not the whole Black man attached to the bloody griffin. The griffin.) That doesn't even get into what having the only Black male companion being part of that choice in the first place says. (Pssst. It's not good.)

Um... the Qunari have long been PoC coded and what they did to the Qunari in Veilguard is nothing short of writing them as innately evil and savage. Seriously? Truly shocked by that one. Taash's first romance scene is really problematic, too.

"A storyline where a goddess is a prop to paint a white guy as awesome?" Did they even play BG3? I've played it 5x and have no idea what they're on about there. And Vlakkith has always been a bitch. (I've been playing D&D since 2E. Is it problematic? Fuck yes.) I guess female and woman presumed people aren't allowed to be evil. Who knew?

Snorts. I'm not white, not a man, definitely not straight, and good fiction is my actual job.

As far as the ad hominem attacks. (Sad head shake) Dirthara-ma, da'len.

All that in response to this post of mine.

[retro-stars]

What. What if Voltron legendary defender and Rottmnt crossover?

Listen, I have a vision: A younger Lance ran into Leo April-style and he as the reason why Leo originally started learning Spanish

He makes good friends with the turtles and co, acting as something of a fun cousin since he's not in New York consistently and absolutely refuses any Donnie upgrades to his tech when he goes off to the Garrison about a month before the season one plot gets rolling since he wants to be an awesome pilot the fair way or something like that

They talk constantly over message and call, giving updates back and forth. They even manage some in person meet-ups for a while once Leo got the hang of consistent long-distance teleportation before Lance ended up in space

Hunk knows them fairly well (the consequences of being a childhood friend of one Lance McClain, you end up knowing a lot of random people through the weirdest circumstances), but they've only met really online or over the phone with the exception of April He's taken to exchanging recipes with Mikey and talking engineering and biochem with Donnie and giving Leo advice. His default talking buddy is Raph through and through though

Pidge didn't get a chance to meet them but she does hear of them, so they're unaware of the whole mutant thing and also that the fellow rogue hacker she sometimes finds digging through the Garrison databases and the super-smart-and-obnoxious-about-it Donnie she reminds Lance of are in fact the same person. Donnie doesn't tell Lance that he's pretty sure Pidge is in fact one teenaged Katie Holt tricking the entirety of the US military and government because he thinks it's funny and wants to see how long it takes Lance to notice the literal fucking soap opera going on around him. Lance has some suspicions as to how legitimate Pidge's identity is anyway since Donnie is horrid at hiding how he's a little too curious about her, though he never gets a confirmation up until Pidge actually tells the team

AS FOR THE ACTUAL PLOT:

The Garrison Trio's disappearance happens literally like. right before the events of the movie. The timing of those two things just generally ended up really unfortunate, 'cause Lance got into the fighter pilot course and started dealing with some serious issues with his self-esteem and peers as well as the additional stress of the bigger workload right as the team dynamics with turtles started getting really bad

And when he disappeared they didn't get a chance to act on their suspicions due to the whole Kraang situation and after that it was mostly rebuilding and recovery and just hoping and praying Lance returned at some point because all of them were too scared of asking Casey jr. about his future for fear of the answer

Meanwhile Lance is dramatizing his reactions to the whole space thing despite it honestly not being that much of a shift to his worldview after the whole "oh yeah there's magic and a whole bunch of different races living underneath New York that all share the common trait that they lowkey hate/fear humans" thing The whole Galra Keith thing comes out and Lance is just chilling and waiting to ask if he can get tested for anything off with his DNA too since he's not entirely sure how mystic energy works and if it can rub off on someone or like. unlock some secret abilities or something so at this point it's better safe than sorry

When they come back to Earth the first words out of Lance's mouth are just the dawning horror of "I'm gonna die, aren't I?" because he knows that Donnie has been digging around the Garrison classified files since he applied to the academy and there is no way he hasn't broken in and seen the video/warning they sent to Earth already and he is most definitely going to be absolutely pissed Lance didn't at least try and send them a message letting them know he was alive at the very least

The team is just staring in confusion as Lance's face slowly goes through the five stages of grief before settling on the expression of a man facing his execution. Except for Hunk. Hunk took a second but as soon as he got it he was full belly laughing as Lance's expense (or at least until Lance reminds him that they're gonna kill him too since he didn't contact them either. Then he's just scared.)

[thenukacolachallenge]

some fun facts about Luis and André Peña(his VA)

(from the Nick Apostolides(Leon Kennedy VA) livestreams, because i think Luis is neato and i liked André's performance, especially for a first-time big VA gig!)

UPDATE: NOW WITH TIMESTAMPS bc someone on the part two of this post asked about them lmfao

-André actually auditioned for the Spanish cops that escort Leon to Valdelobos originally, and went through several more auditions before landing the role of Luis Serra. for his first role on a big project like Resident Evil, that's incredibly impressive! (timestamp)

-Both Nick and André did motion capture for multiple enemies, including André calling his "best role" playing a dead body lmao. He and Nick also did mocap for the Verdugos, Salazar's bodyguards! (timestamp)

-Being that it was such a big role, he was very anxious about the game dropping, from the moment he got cast to the day it dropped. He even apparently asked Nick constantly if he had somehow been recast. (poor dude, as someone with anxiety issues and huge imposter syndrome, i feel for him!!!) Nick gives him a very sweet but stern pep talk about how he earned and deserved his role on stream too, it was a cute moment! (timestamp 1: André first mentioning his nerves) (timestamp 2: second mention of anxiety/Nick's pep talk to André)

-André is a big enough fan of the original to remember where all the treasure used to be! i love when people who are fans of a series get to work on it, dude. in addition, he was also very happy with the direction he was given, and felt that he was allowed to explore Luis as a more fleshed out character. (which he absolutely is, and i love it! Luis in the original was so strange and honestly off-putting imo. fucking ballistics lmao) (timestamp 1: first mention of André knowing a lot about RE4) (timestamp 2: more of André knowing the game) (timestamp 3: MORE of André knowing the game lmao) (there are a lot more than just these. dude is a FAN) (timestamp 4: André talking about direction and Luis)

-He refers to the bag Luis is stuffed into as a "Luis burrito", which is hilarious and adorable. (timestamp)

-(Also, not related to Luis, but Nick yells "YEET" when Leon gets tossed into the wall by Mendez, which is fucking hysterical) (timestamp)

-UPDATE: thank you to tumblr user @hamartia-grander for this detail that i completely missed originally! (timestamp)

(transcript: I hope this okay for me to add, but he also said that in the first scene with Leon and Luis, Luis looks away as Mendéz injects Leon with la plaga because he couldn't watch another person be infected by something horrible he had a hand in creating. Which is easy to infer from that scene, but it was nice that it was a conscious decision on André's part, rather than aimless direction.)

-the first scene André and Nick filmed together was Luis and Leon chained up together! and the first line of Luis's that got revealed was when he said to Leon, "I guess you, me... picked the wrong spot to vacation, eh?" Apparently the mocap for this scene was also very awkward for André, which is totally understandable, considering Luis spends 90% of it getting jerked around by Leon or trying to dodge a Ganado without the use of his hands lol. (timestamp)

-André worked very hard to make sure that Luis's accent was as accurate to Spain's Spanish as it could be, which is awesome, especially for someone who doesn't naturally speak that particular dialect. GOOD ACTING, BABEY (timestamp)

-André owns a legitimate Red 9 gun, the weapon that Luis uses in the game. this is a unique gun bc it was manufactured during the first World War, and it's VERY expensive(they can go up to $10k, but André apparently got his for a great deal!). he also has MADE a copy of the RE4 tactical knife Leon uses, and there's a video up on his youtube channel! (timestamp)

-(not related to Luis, but André also mentioned he has adhd! same buddy!!!) (timestamp)

-OKAY NEW STREAM TIME! This begins part four of Nick's playthrough, and André is a guest once more. All the previous facts are from part one, which is the first one André guested on. According to Nick, André learned how to flip a lighter around his fingers just for Luis, which is awesome. (and he shows off by doing so in stream!!!) (timestamp)

-Ashley's VA, Genevieve Buechner, got asked about her reaction to Luis' infamous "ballistics" line and both her and André aren't sad to see it missing from the remake. André himself makes a comment about how this version of Luis is still flirty without coming across as "creepy" about it. (i find the ballistics line from the original annoying, and it was a huge part of why i didn't care for Luis in og re4, so i too am VERY glad it's gone) (timestamp)

-André jokes about Luis breaking the brake on the minecart: "I react so depressed, like.... 'Guess that's it, bro.' 'Hey man, I tried.'" He really does! it feels like a mix of sheepishness at breaking it in the first place, and just very, resigned and depressed lol. (timestamp)

-Sadly, because he hadn't played up to that point yet, he didn't watch Luis' death scene, and therefore didn't have much to say on it :c

-when the cast was asked what kind of pet each of their characters would have, André said Luis would be a cat person, and he'd probably specifically adopt a stray cat, probably one that "adopted" him first. I definitely agree! (timestamp)

i havent watched Nick's last vid in the series yet but this is long enough as it is! im planning on watching some of André's streams up on his personal channel, and some others where he's a guest in, and i may make a part 2 of this :D (update: i did, link at the top of the post lol)

[tobiasdrake]

I've been thinking about Mystique's costume (or lack thereof) in the X-Men movies, and I have to wonder: is there a way to portray an attractive naked woman as a serious, scary threat without sexualizing them? I just wonder because I think of these two enemies in the video game Outlast who everyone loves because of how legitimately terrifying they are, and also the fact that they're completely naked when they stalk you. I feel like a female equivalent of them would be awesome.

I think the key word there is "attractive". There isn't really a non-sexualized way to hire a supermodel to strut around the set naked regardless of gender because that is a sexually-charged creative decision to make. There isn't really a non-sexual reason why you would want a character to be portrayed as a nude supermodel.

There has been female nudity in media which comes across as monstrous rather than alluring. The trick with making female nudity unappealing is the same as with male: If you want the character to come across as monstrous, you have to design them as a monster. Let her be ugly. Let her have a fucked up face and a body type that isn't conventionally attractive like those two neanderthal-looking guys have.

If you're going for "supermodel bombshell" and "serious threat", that's not a monster. That's a femme fatale. Mystique is a femme fatale. That's a different vibe. Femme fatales, incidentally, are com-pli-cated subject matter when it comes to gender.

The topic touches on the larger conversation about the way female characters are often shaped to be appealing as sex objects while male characters are shaped to be appealing as power fantasies.

Like. Goku gets his clothes blasted off a lot. So do a bunch of female anime characters. But when it happens to women, they don't usually come away looking like this.

"Oh no, my clothes! Now everyone will see how powerful my muscles are! You could slice meat on these abs!"

As a consequence of the male gaze dominating media landscapes, female nudity is often designed to be appealing to men while male nudity is designed to also be appealing to men.

But the femme fatale is complicated. The femme fatale marries sexuality and power together. She's an alluring sex object and a powerful, lethal woman. Everybody fucking loves Ada Wong. Whether they want to sleep with her or be her, I have never met a single person who does not love Ada Wong.

That fight in X-Men 1 where Wolverine is roaring and slashing while Mystique's bouncing around in Full Monty really puts a spotlight on it. Like, that's it. That is male vs. female character design in a nutshell right there. It's hard to claim that the intent is to feel empowered by the naked supermodel jumping around on set. Nonetheless, she dominates the fight and kicks Wolverine's ass.

Then you have characters like Bayonetta. And opinions are very divided on Bayonetta. Hell, even in my household, opinions are divided on Bayonette. Bestie loathes Bayonetta with every fiber of their being and their wife has ravenously consumed every game Bayonetta's ever appeared in.

IDK. Female sexuality and its relationship to both objectification and empowerment is an extremely complicated topic and I am not the person to make any definitive statement on the matter.

[tlgtw]

Aside fromsoft, are there any fantasy game settings/stories you're into?

Like what was the first game that pulled you in and before you realized you were checking dialogue for inconsistencies?

Zoooooomg, I *wish* had any other answer for this but the first game that "pulled me in" indeed WAS a Fromsoft game; and it was Bloodborne.

This came around a few months after it came out, (Meaning I was 14.) and I'd wanted Bloodborne the whole time because of how wicked fucking awesome it looked. (even if perhaps I was a little too young for it.)

I can't remember how, but by some means or another leading up to or concurrently with Bloodborne's initial release I got into all the "Loretubers" from that time, as they're known now.

VaatiVidya of course--most likely he was the first person I ended up watching, but also the other ones. Like the one who wrote that big book about it basically called like "The Paleblood Hunt" or something, and a few others!

The most significant of which I can tell you for a fact was the 'late' Jerks Sans Frontieres.

Her videos shot straight into my spinal cord because she wasn't a summarizer. She, in a similar sense that I am now, was a detective.

At that point I was still purely an audience-member for that latent genre of YouTube videos. As the consumer I enjoyed all of them, but I liked her's best. And I must've rewatched each of her Bloodborne videos at least a half-dozen times before I finally got my hands on the game myself--for my 15th birthday--and I got *so* scared by my experience in Central Yharnam that I think it took me days to pick up the controller again the second time.

I legitimately considered returning it! It was my first FromSoft game. I'd never played something that just, say, *didn't* have background music all the time, for example. I remember it still, clear as day, how unnerving it was just walking around the early areas hearing just your footsteps and the background rumble and when I was unlucky the screaming sounds of the crows and other enemies.

Precisely, when I first came up that ladder to the Central Yharnam checkpoint, when I heard the scream of the Cleric Beast, it scared me out of my wits so goddamn hard that I stopped moving for like 15 seconds.

I was still *just* turned 15, but at that point I had watched all of Bloodborne over and over again like 80 times. I'd watched tutorials and build guides and cheese strats and weapon movesets and everything else I could about that game, before I finally got my hands on it. I thought I would be, at least, ultimately okay. Cause I would still know everything I'd have to do.

I was wrong.

But I did get through it, hahaha.

In-fact I ended up getting through it so hard that by the time I got my hands on the actual DLC, my main save file was in NG++. So the first time I beat The Old Hunters was in NG++.

Fortunately I was very grinded-up so I think ultimately the experience balanced out.

And nowadays I've beaten Bloodborne so many times that I have the entire level of Central Yharnam actually memorized. Until a few years ago could've draw an accurate map of it from memory (and I have).

With Bloodborne being my introduction, as it were, to the concept of Videogame Story Explained Videos, it was also my introduction to the concept of seriously reading a videogame's story in the first place.

What this wasn't, yet, was me actually going in *myself* to actually cross-reference item descriptions and dialogue, for my *own* understanding. You don't do that sorta thing unless you're specifically involved in discussion. And I was involved in *no* discussions in 2015, or 2016, or '17 or '18 or '19 or anything all the way up to until 2022, because online I have the tendencies of a weird hermit.

Although that is me exaggerating. In truth prior to my dealings with Elden Ring I had been a Redditor and I talked (argued) about the story details of Little Nightmares 1 and 2 (My favourite games.) on the subreddit for those games. By then I had already become the kind of person I am still now, most of all in my disinterest in finding any answers regarding a fictional story that can't account for every extant element... of that story. (As you've seen, and will see more of in Episode X of ERwSET. When an idea I have appears to conflict with work in subject, I drop the idea. And develop one that doesn't conflict with it instead. This is opposed to the alternative of making up reasons or justification to keep the initial idea regardless)

No doubt doing that instead would probably make me a lot more content to make money with... Personally, doing so isn't engaging to me, because I am already someone who writes fiction. And in my opinion, "Videogame Story Explained Videos" are fundamentally a non-fiction genre of video, and for me are more interesting in general when they conform to that, because they interface directly with the media itself, and the material that media's author's put into it. Rather than just the individual video creator's personal experience of that media, of that material.

In part this comes from my background as someone who writes poetry and fiction. Of course.

*Of course,* an author who writes and puts meanings into material themselves, finds themselves more interested dissecting the material and creative decisions of *other authors,* who do the same thing, as opposed to the material and creative decisions of just *other readers.* Who most of them don't--generally maintaining more humane professions and areas of expertise instead.

And probably this is rooted into my tendencies as a 'weird hermit,' too. But, from my perspective, if I wanted to see what a fellow member of the audience thinks are the inner working of this character or imagines regarding the off-screen elements of a story, I would read their fanfiction.

...

...

That is of course reductive, but I think saying it like that is really funny, so that's why I'll be still saying it xd.

"Everyone consumes, but not everyone makes," you could say. The same way there are less farmers than people in the world. There are less writers than readers in the world. When I analyze a work of fiction, underneath it all what I'm looking for is to see what decisions the authors made, for *their final product:* "What does that do?" "What does this do?" "If it was different, what would that make?" "What does this matter? Does it?"

"Would I do this too?"

And this interest excludes the question of 'why,' predominantly. I'm not interested so much in wanting to know 'why,' because the only way to learn that is if the author themselves actually decides to share "why." I'm interested just in what the final decisions "are."

"Why'd the author decide to make this character do this?" Well, maybe they were really hungry that day. Or maybe they saw an ad on TV. Or maybe they were talking to their friend about something unrelated and their friend happened to say a phrase in a peculiar and cool way and the author decided he wanted to make use of that, too. And everything else that encompasses the spectrum of the human experience.

"Why" is whatever it wants, it's not like it would change what the final product "is," right?

And of course this doesn't preclude the fact that author's can just *lie* about their motivations too. For that reason, actually trying to find out 'why' is generally an impossible task.

And I'm not interested in pursuing those/I'm not interested in not #winning.

Perhaps this, you could say, then, is the ultimate source of my attitude. Not in the way that it's why I actually decided to write and draw and voice and edit my 80% Elden Ring lore series and 15% weird cartoon; "Elden Ring Explained with Snake-Eyes Teieruji." I did all those for completely circumstantial reasons! (And I go into detail about them in Issue #0 of the Kinda-Monthly Newsletter.)

Nor even in how my show is... the way it is! 'Cause even that is just me being really really slow and meticulous, (as you've no doubt suffered) and anyone can act like that~!

But it is, perhaps, what made me come up with the idea of making such a show as ERwSET, at all, in the first place. (And you can also read about the *second* major exclusion in my recounting here from that same article in Newsletter #0, which was the Sekiro-related project for which Snake-Eyes Teieruji was actually created, that didn't end up going anywhere.)

You'd have be a pretty specific kind of chucklehead to actually think of doing, specifically all this; y'know?

But you may be surprised to learn that I'm normally not like this at all, when I play videogames. Most of my creative energy in such regards are channeled into my poetry, art, and fiction. When I eat games, or movies, or books or TV, I don't really feel a want to find out "exactly what the author did for this character" or "exactly what elements of this scene connect with another scene" because I guess, perhaps, I'm too occupied with enjoying myself...

Hm.

Well, maybe it'll be more accurate to say that what I'm presenting, "of myself" in ERwSET, is effectively extremely extremely scripted and deliberate.

I spend months writing my scripts. (sorry about that.) And those months include the meticulous cross-referencing and fact-checking that gives those videos their noticeable pow.

It's a large amount of *work,* that that is. The desk-jockeying kind. And it's not something that can just do itself when you're relaxing playing any game normally. (I'll never just stop what I'm doing while playing a game to fact-check whether I'm currently right about something, while I'm still in the middle of playing it.

For example in my first playthrough of Elden Ring: I wasn't actually sure how Marika's name was spelled until I had finished my first playthrough. That I wasn't sure if it was "Marika" or "Merika" at the time just legitimately didn't concern to me. I just didn't pay that close of attention whenever I passed a Church of Marika or whatever to actually remember how it spelled her name, afterwards.

I actually kept a journal to keep track of all of my sidequests and stuff for my first playthrough, too! So maybe here's another example, haha:

And here's one more dfbjkskjdbfbkjsdkjbfsjdsf. These are all things I actually wrote down in the middle of playing the game so reading these myself is really fucked up I just remember what I was doing when I wrote them:

What I'm referring to as 'the fucking castle' there is actually what I thought the Siofra Aquaduct was, the first time I saw it, hahaha. I was even a little bummed out when I actually got to it, I'll admit. I thought it was gonna be an entire dungeon.)

In any case;

The experience of *creating* something, and the experience of *consuming* something, are just fundamentally incomparable things.

You could never figure out how houses are built by just living in one, even if you lived in one for a really long time. Right?

It's that very sort of thing; in terms of cross-referencing dialogue and noting game-wide consistencies and inconsistencies for discrepancies and explanations, no playing a game inspired me do that, or could. It was my becoming an author of fiction that inspired me to do that, and my burgeoning desire to understand the decisions *other authors* made, for *their* fiction.

"I wanna know how to do that too." Right?

Eventually this desire lead to me writing poems instead.

Which lead to me (once I finally became good enough at writing to realize--as related in that poem I flashed from highschool in ERwSET1) disavowing the written word entirely! TOO limited for me, I though...!

Pictures have WAY more pow than words!!!

And that's how I got into drawing...

(which are like *way* more powerful than words, right, like it's not even comparable, the only thing words are up-to-down unbeatable at is, indeed, non-fiction... but also in being a trillion times faster than everything else to actually work with. I have returned to the written word, since then, as you might tell. And I'll tell you that writing also has one advantage that no other skill on Earth has--and that's you can practice it using only your head. Every other skill needs equipment, lit only needs words.)

...which is lead me to my foray *now;* the likes of 2-dimensional medias like video! (visual + audio)

:DDD

But that's maybe not the kind of question you were actually asking, either... so...

Y'know... maybe it actually *is* Elden Ring, that's what 'pulled me in'.

I'm pretty far-in-deep right now in this, aren't I? And I've certainly never been this deep in something before!

How... did I get here...!?

I talk all about this in Issue 0 of the Newsletter as well but it's because of how Elden Ring served to combined FromSoftware's skills in atmosphere, the acting of the characters, visuals + audio, and gameplay, with George RR Martin's skills in actually have a coherent plot to present with those elements.

I've stated so before so I'll say so again that earlier FromSoft games such as Bloodborne and (especially) Dark Souls 3 are, to *a* meaningful extent, "not worth" looking into closely from a narrative perspective. In the way that their stories were never purposely finished.

The Soulsborne games have the reputation of having stories that are predominantly based on vibes, and that's not by accident. They are based on vibes.

Gameplay, atmosphere, acting, etc. Those are things that dictate the vibes. But they're not precise. You can't find the definitive answer to a character motivation in their boss theme, that's music.

*Power,* of course, they have in spades, but obviously not any 'precision.'

As we know, Bloodborne had a lot of cut content. And Dark Souls 3.

And as a result of the same internal situations (i.e. real life reasons like time, budget, and workforce) that lead to all that content being cut, a number of the questions you would ask regarding the plot details in those games, literally do not have answers *in* those games.

The stories of Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3 are ambiguous. But not in the way that there are multiple answers: In the way that there are *no* answers.

Again, that isn't by accident. The games themselves are obviously, literally, finished products. It was deliberate decisions made during production to *remove* material communicating parts of the story, for variable reasons, from what would become the finished product.

Thus, leading to parts of "the story" being, for the reader; missing.

Most people will frame this as equivalent to "the audience deciding what the truth is." And I think this is completely inaccurate.

"The audience can choose what the truth is" is when there would be multiple possible answers. (Little Nightmares 1 and 2 are my favourite games.)

"The audience can *never* know what the truth is" is when there are no possible answers.

And in my opinion they are completely different narrative outcomes. They shouldn't be equated.

...

...not acknowledging, of course, the *massive* amount of subjective legwork the word 'possible' is doing there, with those vibes-based definitions:

"Possible" as in, coherent with what is (percieved to be) in the text... by the reader?

Or "possible" as in, literally possible to be imagined by someone... such as the reader, whoever that happens to be?

The topic is only more complex from there. (All into academia and shit tho I wouldn't know I'm an art school dropout.)

And... almost definitely that's also not what you asked, either...

Hm...

Well, I ask that you forgive me.

As for *why* Elden Ring was special to me, circumstantially, such that it lead to my actually making ERwSET, the explanation for that will remain in Issue 0 of the Members-Only Kinda-Monthly Newsletter.

As to *what* lead to me becoming this way, as you see before you? (Insane.) I hope I was able to answer it.

As for RECOMMENDATIONS, for games in general, that inspire ME, personally!?!?!? (Specifically, in the way that they inspired me to think about the setting and wonder about how things in there connect. These listing might look random but I'm positive they're exactly what you might mean in you including, specifically, what "settings" I'm into. Albeit, you are getting this from a poet. So... there is that as well. I hope if you end up looking into any of these that you do end up pleased with the experience.)

Hohokum (2014), for PS4 and PC

GRIS (2018), for basically everything

Bloodborne (2015), but note it standing directly *on* Elden Ring

Minute of Islands (2021) for PC and consoles

The surrealist artbook "Codex Serafinianus" by Italian artist Luigi Serafini (originally published in 1981, but still added to by him occasionally with an updated 40th anniversary edition having been released in 2021.)

Gorogoa (2017), for basically everything again

Child of Light (2014), also, for basically everything, somehow

Flower (2009), available on PC (and I really cannot overstate how important 'Flower' is to me, I didn't even know games could *be* like that, before I played this)

And of course, my all-time favourite book "The Vine That Ate the South" by the band The Legendary Shack Shakers's basically only actual member, JD Wilkes. (A book that has all-but baked itself into my genome since I first read it in highschool, and the additional 29 times I've read it since. 'Cause I have been counting. I voraciously recommend the Audible-licensed Recorded Books and RB Digital audiobook version; the narrator T. Ryder Smith's voice is a trillion bucks for that book.)

And y'know what I think I'm wanting to mirror this answer directly into the Kinda-Monthly Newsletter itself. Not all my readers follow me on Tumblr, even fewer'll be online at the right time as to actually *see* this post this before it's buried under everything else I'll post afterwards, and I've just spent the last few hours enjoying the hell out of myself writing all 3100 words of it, gyahahahhahaha!!

So, for those who aren't reading this!

Look forward towards seeing it the first time, in Issue #1 of the T-L-G-T-W Official Fanclub Members-Only Kinda-Monthly Newsletter. (The Issue that'll be available for free.)

My reader, I also hope you don't mind your ask ending up inspiring me to do this. But you might be the first of more, too.

So for now, going forward for any questions and answers such as these asked to me (even anonymously) on Tumblr blog, that activate me like this one has; *they* might just end up in the *next* Issue of the Newsletter, too...!

I can't say for certain I'll announce every that do, ahead of time.

But, maybe... you'll just be able to just... tell. Somehow.

Hm

[doodle17]

Just got back from the fnaf movie

!!SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS!! TRUST ME THIS MOVIE IS SOOO WORTH WATCHING WITHOUT SPOILERS JUST HOLD OUT A LITTLE LONGER I BELIEVE IN YOU

Please remember if you reblog go tag with every fnaf spoiler tag you can think of btw!

Anyways

This

Movie

Was so... godamn...

GOOOD!!!!!!!!

DUDE, I KID YOU NOT THIS MOVIE FUFILLED EVERY SINGLE ONE OF 10 YEAR OLD ME'S EXPECTATIONS AND DREAMS AND IT FILLED MY CURRENT ONES TOO

You guys it was just- AHGAYAGAHWHOWWHOSBSOANALENSLSN

First of all: absolutely loved how it wasn't overly violent. I'm not a prude, but when it comes to gore and violence, I'm very particular. Everyone who follows me knows I'm not a fan of gore, and luckily this movie had none!

It was still pretty gruesome. Like the guy getting his face eaten by Mr. Cupcake and that one girl who got bitten in half by Freddy. But even then, all you could see was the silhouette and her lower half fall to the floor. And 90% of the other scenes you do see, but they kind of let the sounds of what's happening fill in the gaps as the camera goes somewhere else, like with Mr. Cupcake.

Even when you see their bodies later on in the parts and services, the end results of what happened earlier aren't even that bad! Tbh it's almost too dark to even see anything

I loved that! It made it perfectly fine for me to watch and not squirm uncomfortably or feel sick. It actually shocked me! Most gore just makes me roll my eyes and want to gag but this stuff literally made me say "WOAH that's MESSED UP" (enthusiastically) out loud a few times!

Also the parts with the animatronics playing with Abby.... GOD that really filled a void in me that I never knew I had... Watching them play and build a fort and be goofy... Really made me smile so hard!... Uh, as if they didn't kill a bunch of dudes earlier.... Hmm..

All the little references made me point at the screen and squeal! That MatPat cameo my goodness! It made me laugh too lol, which I was pretty surprised about! I wasn't expecting to laugh, smile and cry in a scary movie but here we are!

Every Balloon Boy jumpscare got me, because even though it was, as all those video game critics say, "a cheap spook with a loud noise" I can guarantee a lot of other people did too

AND FELLAS WE GOT IT!!! SPRINGLOCK FAILURE BABYYYYY!!!

I think I was pretty pleased with how they did the springlocks. The reveal... The way Abby said "They can see you now." As they turn to William... Their real Killer... HOT DAMNNNNN AND THEN HE SAYS THE FUCKING LINE AND PUTS ON THE HEAD JUST- CHILLS DUDE (I should probably mention how loud this movie made me btw)

And that part legitimately made my eyes water too! When they dragged him away, the music and him twitching... All I could think was "JUSTICE!"

And I love that they made William a horrible father from what we saw when he talked with Vanessa. It always irks me the wrong way when people try to portray him as a sad parent who lost his daughter and that's why he did what he did. Like- no. He wasn't okay in the head you guys, he was NOT a good father, EVER. I'm sorry but no, he literally neglected, emotionally, and possibly, physically abused his kids.

And I love what they did with characters too! I like how the movie just did its own thing that to me, felt like What fnaf REALLY is.

I never like fnaf lore as it is now. I like when the premise was simply: "guy kills kids, hides their bodies in suits, ghosts posses the animatronics, and want to take revenge but don't remember their killer, so they kill anyone they think is him." Before all that sci-fi stuff got involved. And the Movie is just that! "guy kills kids, hides their bodies in suits, ghosts posses the animatronics, and want to take revenge but don't remember their killer, so they kill anyone they think is him."!! It was awesome!

And I like how it explains that there's the possibility that while the kids posses them, they also have somewhat minds of their own. At least that's what I got from some stuff revealed. There's ways been a part of me that thought the animtronics themselves had minds of their own, so to see that it could be a possibility (in the movies canon at least) was really cool!

Also... Living tombstone fnaf 1 song :) in end credits!

And to end this off, sadly there wasn't a post credit scene sadly (unless you count that CoryxKensin getting jumpscared by the BB toy after the fancy credits)

But!!!! Did anyone else notice the fnaf 2 music box playing in the end credits? And the one noise that says the letters and stuff during the secret fnaf 2 minigames...?

I mean, Matthew did say he signed for 2 more movies... So who's to say we won't get a Fnaf 2 movie based off the evidence of what we heard there, huh? Just a little thought I decided to leave here before we end things off :)

FORGOT TO MENTION that both me and Cherri SCREAMED the lyrics for the fnaf song at the end lol,and two girls next to us started recording us lol (not in a mean way we all talked and ranted for a good 3 minutes afterward it was fun!)

[outer-edges]

15 Questions and 15 Mutuals

ahhh ty @liveandletcry23 feel free to bother me all the time

Were you named after anyone?

not that i am aware of. there is a large scale family debate about WHO named me, because my grandma is under the impression she picked out my name, but my father claims HE picked it out. it is very classic harmless family drama.

When was the last time you cried?

oh literally don't even know. probably last week when i was thinking about joel and ellie at some point. or wallowing in my own all-encompassing loneliness.

Do you have kids?

plsss no i still am a kid. not really lol. but still at the age where even the idea of one of my friends telling they're pregnant is like nightmare territory.

Do you use sarcasm a lot?

i think i use it a regular amount? but also i do NOT understand when people are being sarcastic

What's the first thing you notice about people?

kinda weird but typically their eyebrows.

What's your eye color?

controversial question. i say brown but most people around me would say hazel.

Scary movies or happy endings?

why must we pick between these two things?

Any special talents?

i make REALLLYYYY good zucchini bread

Where were you born?

midwesterners rise up!

What are your hobbies?

pretty standard set. watching tv/movies, reading, writing both original stories and fic, and video editing. i also dabble in whatever random craft strikes my fancy.

Have any pets?

a russian tortoise.

What sports did you play/have you played?

like besides park district sports when i was a wee one? none. i'm a legitimate hazard on any kind of sport field/court.

How tall are you?

another controversial question. i say 5'8", however some individuals have measured me at 5'9" and are CONVINCED i am 5'9"

Favorite subject in school?

english 4 life

Dream job?

making movies and tv shows. obviously not going to happen in a million fucking years, but a girl can keep writing her little stories and yearning for the opportunity to put bella ramsey in the solo wilderness survival film they would absolutely devour.

tagging @fieldsoftulips bc ur awesome no pressure tho!

[shawnjacksonsbs]

Trade this #$@&%*! 2-8-25

“We are anxious to know that we want to be and insist upon being considered a part of our democracy, not something apart from it.” – Mary McLeod Bethune

I'm not a big fan of Tyler Perry movies, but the movie The Six Triple Eight was really good. Definitely worth the watch, and exactly why, I believe, Black History Month is important.

There are things we probably wouldn't know, as a whole, otherwise. It should be regular history, but our own history isn't our own whole history. Why on earth would black history, unless deemed super important but lesser men, ever be??

That's sounds right in my head, I hope it fits.

Moving on, to limiting ✌️ peaces.

As if the want, for me to be able to share my pockets of peace wasn't at an all time high alreadu, now this stupid fucking trade war threatens my, our(?), livelihood.

I hope, along with a lot of others, that it's a ruse, but re-watching the video of him saying prices would come down on day 1, and now seeing them go up isn't a way to "trade" up. (See what I did there).

More proveable lies throughout out his political career than any other politician in our history?!!!

C'mon.

I've got enough to worry about, with the people I care for that are scared, now snall businesses may not make it thru either? It's a legitimate worry.

During covid those material prices sky rocketed. It took for ever for that market to even back out, with some prices never returning. And that was way different.

We're not there yet, hope we don't get there, but things are starting to line up with . . .

~

Time to focus on . . .football, the Superbowl is tomorrow!! Kansas City for the 3peat?!?!

And Storytime, which I imagine I'll do from the country, and it'll be way earlier in the day, obviously. Lol

With a grandson's birthday this week, which doubles as the week of love, I'm hoping for better days.

Not to mention, my excitement for next weekend, as we get to . . .unwrap one of the gifts for a couple of the grandlittles. It's gonna be awesome- more info next weekend. Lol.

I guess that's it folks. Work on limiting our spread of disinformation by checking several sources, and helping our young and olders with similar processes. Man, I think our young are gonna need to be pretty fluent in ways to check facts as they move forward in their lives, especially with A.I. getting better by the day.

And keep the hope alive. Find reasons to smile, remember all the things and people we have to be grateful for.

And, like always, please be kind.

Oh yeah, And Damn the Man, Eat the Rich, and don't suffer alone the incoming establishment.

The old ones were bad enough. Lol no lol

GO CHIEFS!

Until next week,

2 quotes and help me make them make sense;

"The State is competent to assign duties and draw the line between good and evil only in its immediate sphere. Beyond the limits of things necessary for its well-being, it can only give indirect help to fight the battle of life by promoting the influences which prevail against temptation--religion, education, and the distribution of wealth." - Lord Acton

&

“Peoples have come to experience that political structures and divisions of power are not immutable. Nor will they perceive the distribution of wealth and resources between nations to be unalterably ordained by heaven and incapable of drastic rearrangement by the less than gentle manipulation of man.” - Bob Hawke

P.S. On the brightside, if history teaches us anything, it teaches us that after the horrors of the holocaust, after internment camps, after the great depression, after any huge horrific tradgey from the past, after all the suffering incurred as part of those, some for years and even decades, there will probably be peace and love again one day. Only the latter years will we know for sure.

Ah, a war could reunite us. Don't be surprised if we're pushed into an altercation.

Just look at . . .history! Js

[disease-danger-darkness-silence]

I was a gifted kid who now has burnout and it was legitimately a 50-50 shot between whether my parents would get "pleasure to have in class" or "has an attitude."

Knowing I'm AuADHD (with PDA) now, it makes sense. I don't like being told what to do and I love challenging the status quo. I am, as many people called me and my dad, a "shit-stirrir".

The nicest comment I ever got from a teacher was actually a compliment to my parents. I think I still have the letter somewhere! She said, approximately, "Thank you for raising someone who doesn't have a herd mentality and isn't afraid of nonconformity. It's a breath of fresh air - she and I may not always agree on things, but I'm always going to learn something new, even if it's just a new way of attacking a problem."

I loved her. I miss her. She's still alive but she didn't tolerate bullshit - in any capacity.

Below is an EXTREMELY autistic, long story about how hyperfixation and overachieving and an extremely neat class project led to me realizing that I'm a phenomenal PR agent. I hate doing it these days, but I did go into press and PR for a while, because of this teacher.

She was my teacher for US Constitution my senior year of high school. I loved her. She had us do a group project (I did it with my friends) that was us all doing political campaigns. There was an odd number of students in the class, so my loner friends and I formed a three-person team.

The class valedictorian, who was angry because I'd pulled a cumulative 3.0 WITHOUT TRYING (and this was back when a cumulative 3.0 was... Actually kinda a big deal. Like, I got offered a full ride to MIT. I didn't take it, mostly because I didn't want to move to Mass) was in this class. Junior year, in US history, he'd made my life a living hell because he felt threatened by me. If I'd been offered valedictorian or salutatorian, I would have declined, because I don't like giving speeches and I didn't care about high school.

He'd contradict everything I said, even if I was objectively right. He'd mock me when I answered questions.

I've been sewing since I was 7 or 8 years old, and I've been making clothing since I was 10. I got my first sewing machine secondhand from my dad when I was 14. When my teacher - also awesome - asked if anyone there knew how to make clothes, I raised my hand and valedictorian dude said, "Fuck off, no you don't," and got almost the entire class to mock me. I brought in my sewing kit the next class and - to the great amusement of my teacher then, who hated him - I proceded to eyeball Valedictorian's size. I spent the period as I usually did, only I was also expertly sewing a simple but matching blouse and skirt in his size. Thank God my sewing machine was quiet, bc I was also in front of the entire class. I presented him with the clothing and he looked like he wanted to punch me.

That's the biggest thing I remember about him, but he absolutely hated me for no reason I could descern prior to that, other than being threatened. After that, I think he had like, an okay reason, because I humiliated him in front of like thirty 17-year-olds.

Anyway, that dickbag was there. I hated him, and while I'm not generally a competitive person, I knew he was. The goal wasn't to win the election, it was to do well and show a fundamental understanding of how fucked up politics is in this country.

But I had to win, because he'd want to.

I told my friends that I WANTED to be the backbone of the project, and they were thrilled.

This was 2002. Video editing was borderline unheard of at a hobbyist level. AMVs were a new phenomenon. Online tutorials barely existed, and YouTube flat-out didn't exist. Amazon was a thing but it was mostly still a bookstore. Smartphones didn't exist either. The internet was in its infancy - you couldn't just reach out and find whatever you wanted with a few touches to some glass. If you wanted to learn a skill, you had to be smart about it - take a class, find someone else to teach you, read a fuckton of books. We barely had digital cameras, FFS.

The year I started high school was the year the AMA developed its first format for citing websites, okay?

I need you to know all of this, because it makes some of this all seem very surreal in retrospect.

Our political campaign was based on the separation of church and state - shit-stirrers, the lot of us. We developed a rough idea of a logo and a platform and like, a color scheme and name that first class, but I mostly did everything. I was fixated on it.

Spite is a helluva motivator.

I made swag (I have always been heavy into fabrication and crafting and graphic design, and I had Photoshop 6, a color printer, label paper of various sizes, a sewing machine, a fuckton of unused chapstick, jewelry assortments, and keychains). Like, good swag. I even used t-shirt paint to screen-print like, can coozies. It took me FOREVER to make the screen - it was basically an embroidery hoop with muslin fabric on it, and I used Elmer's glue to block out the negative spaces.

I made copies of everything to give to the teacher, but I handed swag out to the other students, too.

We had one person pretend to be the presidential candidate - he was the least neurodivergent, most charismatic, and funniest. I was basically the campaign organizer. I gave my other friend the speech writer job on paper, but I wrote the speeches. He had a lot of shit going on at home. I think teach knew, but she didn't call us out on it because I gave him the speeches ahead of time and he familiarized himself with the talking points.

Valedictorian was in speech and debate and was fairly well-liked, so he was his group's candidate. He did really well at his speech, but so did our guy. Why?

Because I am autistic, and I spent my entire 18 years of life up to that point learning how to manipulate and mimic people, because I had no other way to interact with them.

We also had to do one multimedia project. Everyone did like, radio scare ads, or PowerPoint slides like they were doing a TED talk (TED talks existed but you had to physically go to them. Basically no one knew what a TED talk was).

I? I did a campaign video.

It was very bare-bones, but it led with, "Faith is fine, but organized religion causes conflict."

And then it faded in between the Spanish Inquisition, Kosovo, September 11th (fresh on everyone's minds as it was 2002), the Armenian genocide, and a bunch of other stuff that even remotely had ties to religion, all set to Plowed by Sponge.

It ended on a black screen and the words, "Religion and policy don't mix. Vote (I can't remember what our fake party name was) 2002" as Sponge sang, "Say a prayer for me! (Say a prayer for me...)"

It was 5 seconds short of the requirement, but because it was a video we got extra marks. There was like. Stunned applause. Very few people at the school had a computer at home at the time, let alone the ability to do video editing at home. If they wanted to do a video, they had to book time in the newly-built technology center. And the school didn't have video software, and they had Centurion Guard locks on every public computer on the network. When the computer shut off (which they all did automatically at 6 pm and midnight every day), everything reset to base state. So even if you took the time to install video software, it'd be gone next time you got to the computer.

So it was.... Unusual for someone to be able to do this. Hell, just getting the video to the classroom had been hard. I'd burned it onto a CD and brought like 5 different types of A/V cable to connect get computer to the TV. DVD burners barely existed at that point.

The class voted on winners for each category. There were like... Six? Seven categories. You couldn't vote for your own party.

The last category was a debate between the two finalists. I worked HARD on that. I coached the Presidential Candidate on likely talking points based on other speeches the other candidate had made. I brought up talking points we favored. I brought up current policy in the country that was headline news, because the moderator (teach) would bring it up. I made notecards.

I used my dad's router and a tiny bit to make a little oak stencil of our logo that I'd designed and the short catchphrase we'd all come up with, and then I used a dremel to quickly engrave it on a box of pencils. I got blank erasers and used india ink and the stencil to do the same thing, essentially, to those. I got candy. I made stickers. I made little pins of cardstock on little adhesive swing pins. And I got little dog-shit baggies from the dollar store in our party colors. I got cardstock and printed signs.

I put one of each of the small things into the bag and tied it with ribbons in our chosen party colors.

I full-on Hermione Granger'd this shit.

The teacher told us that we were to run our campaigns like actual campaigns we'd witnessed in our lifetimes. I knew PR.

So the day of the debate, I had a bunch of shit in my car. We had alternating days, so we had three classes per day but they were double the length of a regular class. 1st period was 2 class periods long, and then we had a 15 minute "nutrition break" and 5 minutes for travel between class. Then, after 2nd period (also 2 classes long), we had a 35 minute lunch break and another 5 minutes for travel.

The campus is kinda big.

Anyway, after lunch we had 3rd period. Also 2 classes long.

So at nutrition break the day of, I found my teacher and asked her if anything goes as far as political debate stuff. Anything I may have seen happen at a debate or rally. She said yes. I asked if I could set up a table outside the class just before lunch. She was confused, but OKd it.

I set up two TV trays and two boxes of swag. As every person came into the classroom, I offered them a doggie bag of swag and a sign. Pretty much everyone took the swag bag. A bunch of people took signs, too.

When the bell rang, I packed up, moved everything into the classroom, and gave the teacher a bag and a sign to show her what I'd made.

The debate didn't matter. I gave people free shit. I know how this works. A free piece of candy and a pencil you use most days will sway people.

The debate was really good though. My friend nailed it. We won the debate. Valedictorian was fucking ANGRY, but he figured, he was popular. He had time to win people over to his side.

It was a Thursday and a 3-day weekend, so we weren't back until Tuesday.

We won by a fucking landslide. He got like 3 votes, including himself.

Turns out that if you spend an entire semester learning about the importance of policy and PR, it behooves you to remember that - even if you're talking to your friends.

Anyway, that's the story of how one of the best teachers I've ever had helped me piss off the valedictorian out of pure spite, and inspired me to become active in politics, instead of just interested.

Assumption: You were considered "a pleasure to have in class."

Incorrect! I was a pain in the goddamn ass, and frequently got told to stop asking so many questions.

Like literally I had a teacher tell me other people in the class were uncomfortable speaking up because I made them feel insecure by always raising my hand and asking follow up questions and debating subjects.

Apparently people felt like I was showing off, flaunting my intellect, trying to dominate the class socially, being pretentious. Apparently people felt like I was arrogant and only speaking up to make them feel bad.

And like, I'm not gonna say there wasn't ego involved with it, and I'm not gonna say I wasn't way too much to deal with at times - undiagnosed ADHD and all that. I'm also not going to pretend like men aren't raised to believe that we have the right to speak over other people and get attention for our every idle thought. I can completely understand how I could be a fucking misery to deal with in a classroom.

Also, in addition to that, hahaha oops now I have rejection sensitivity dysphoria and lifelong difficulty being myself in social situations. Gee golly willikers, I wonder how that happened!

I literally just wanted to learn things. I was literally just doing exactly what I'd always been told you're supposed to do at school. Everyone else seemed to just want to look into their books and stay silent every time a teacher encouraged us to ask questions, nobody else ever asked questions, and I thought I was supposed to be curious and engaged.

Eventually settled for just reading the encyclopaedias in the school library during recess. The day I discovered Wikipedia was a day of joy and relief, let me tell you.

But yeah, no, outside of maybe one or two teachers who seemed to like my engagement, I was considered disruptive and inconsiderate and got a lot of "he would be a great student if he just applied himself more," by which they seemed to mean "shut up and hand in homework."

[scentedchildnacho]

Uhm I just meant by my Google reviews stuff everybody already knows...if people can't stop fucking with me or others or messing with me their life won't change ..

Women's law isn't different if you flash poverty and call it your misery object then you still have to live under alcohol unions in a heretical idea

Maybe they don't know or forget or just stop thinking about it but people have a right for the d.a. to tell them their immediately prosecuted

It's heresy it's beastiel all I have known it to be my friend heyroth hated me hated me and so she could be a drunk and brace face slave if people can't get off revenge at the world then the alcohol unions come for you

People have a tendency to think they can be too close to heyroth and it's just funny she is a feMale and deeply suspicious of the feminine for wanting to be close friends with people and she would do all she could to hurt me away from her disease....her lung collapsed and she hallucinated a lot of phobias

She had this really cute immigrant step sister just very cute and nice that like shared home pogrom with her anything she could do to make valla go away

She maybe had a criminology issue like brain damage....because she was learning handicapped she would try to hurt people if their affections were misplaced or wrong or illusory and just keep getting stuck then with us

Heyroth couldn't ever learn basic soap operas...you have to be spiritually direct and kind....your just stuck in your head you don't actually care about me....

When people break up with people normally then I finally go away if you keep getting into being a misery beater then I can't go away

I wonder about no one is special if the universe in it's cold calculated logic to carry out a strategy provides a decent life for people who hate and Holocaust on me and it is wrong it would feel much better if it was a legitimate war on me

They have horrible prostitute drug addict lives

Yea the correct environ for the heresy is northern European exotics like Hieronymus Bosch

Well I use to feel bad for chicks because my own consciousness was too intensely innocent I was expected as jobs to do my little help chores and so my world view remained unmaturate having seen more black lives matters artists I don't feel bad for segregated jobs at all if it's my secret powers world view...

I don't know what happened at the library today but it's again too rich of an issue using library space or attempting to kill the poor with housing inclusions

But they kept speed walking through on their they was fat program so I was afraid of it like I needed to watch Christopher hitchens for what their essential basement falsehood is

Simm theory has no relevance doomsday theory or the native creation myth does....

But they all went into the library to have a kids birthday party so others may not learn read or grow....it's just not at all the time or place for the bad behaviour lash out

They wanted a like for real fantasy basement party at the library

When I had my basement I would get these fantasies about my life that didn't work out actually being a really crack head kick ass ending in my favor

And every time I had this fantasy world in my basement room I would totally win in some way in the fantasy

Anyway these fantasies were pretty psychotic and schizo and yet eveny family had deference for this time I needed to simm theory so

Anyway in Natchez I was told that's a pretty awesome counter culture to get to do angels and fantasy and video games....like retribution what if what's going on in those fantasies isn't about people maybe some are immortal now

I could have been Vanderbilt and spawned things

Then I found out about Peggy mason getting to be neurobiology so in some way my disability was a capability I guess.....oops...

Archangel Michael and Satan

Anyway having to try to make me poop my pants is not a good life.....I went to the farmers market and that's very

[twopoppies]

alright currently on the train writing this through my tears but oh my god gina it was honestly surreal

i was near the back and there were loads of tall people (my 5ft1 ass could NEVER) so i couldn't see super well but istg i didn't even need to

the energy, the sound, the people all around us, i was just completely enveloped into this atmosphere of just... love, and acceptance, and understanding. not to be a larrie but it just felt like coming home. there were a few moments were i just closed my eyes and just focused on like feeling everyone, all the happiness, the music, i just let myself enjoy it with something other than my eyes and it was absolutely magical.

JHO was pretty special to me too, cause it's the song that quite literally saved me, stopped me multiple times from just ending it when things got tough, and hearing him sing just felt like it was all worth it and that i could do anything. he makes me feel invincible.

everyone screamed all three "LARRY"s during 7, the princess park line legitimately shook the entire venue and everyone around me screamed it at the top of their lungs, the U R OUR BECAUSE project went down perfectly and he looked so happy seeing us hold the signs, the amount of rainbows and rainbow lights during OTB just made me bawl it was so good, and THE LIGHTS DURING TWO YOUNG. the videos do not do it justice, he looks like an actual angel standing in front of the doors of heaven singing us in, it was something of a religious experience tbh.

now onto my het hours cause we need those sometimes.

the 7 high note and SECond to MAself absolutely killed me omg he's so hot it's like sorry h but PLEASE RAIL ME. matt? sir you are so fucking fine just say the word and i'm on my knees. michael? i don't know whether i should tell you to keep doing your riffs or to stop cause but either way if you need a dog i can bark. isaac? ✨isaac✨ i have no words. steve? we need more big screen videos of steve smiling along while he plays the drums and looking surprised every time we sing. tommy from otp? sir, may have your hand in marriage please? your vibes are absolutely immaculate

speaking of otp, they were so good!! they really know how to warm up a crowd, there was also a project for every song i ever wrote (which was honestly amazing) and i just had so much fun. we were jumping around all the time, singing, dancing, yelling, then crying a little at ceasefire but oh well, it's still amazing

now for the little things i noticed cause my anxiety made me hyperaware of everything so i tried to direct that to the stage, lights, and louis, instead of the people around me.

otp had very clear blue and green lights for about half of the second song, to the point where i was cautiously suspicious cause it didn't seem to fit the vibe of their poster. then whenever the lights went down to announce a new song there were lights in the back that i think flashed blue and green, but it could also have just been a sort of turquoise almost, not completely sure due to the distance so take with a grain of salt. he was also very happy when we screamed the princess park line so keep it up!!

paramedics came through the crowd a good couple times, and we had to stop the show once when he started fearless for the first time cause someone passed out (which, like, i feel bad for this, but het hours part 2 when he said "stop the show" and everyone legitimately stopped everything...i get why he's the dom, i get it) but we got back pretty soon

i met some awesome people, they were just so nice!! and everyone was pretty kind, signaled immediately when someone went down, and were pretty diligent about passing around water and making sure people around, strangers or not, were alright. so i'm pretty proud of us for that ngl.

i also got louis grey and green world tour hoodie cause it looked extremely comfortable and i figured yk why not, this might be the only time i get to go, you never know what's gonna happen, so might as well get something to make me happy (it did, it made me very happy, it's extremely warm and comfortable even if it was 70 fucking francs. worth it.) the cool thing (and by cool i mean panic) was that while standing in front of the barriers in front of the merch store, and pretty girl got all up on my back like pressed against me all proper and just went "sorry, hope i'm not bothering you, there's just loads of people trying to push me"

sweetheart you can push into me any day any time oh my god that felt like the start of my fanfic love story

(it wasn't, i just said "don't worry, you can stay as close as you want", enjoyed ten minutes of uninterrupted cuddle time with you i've now dubbed The Gay That Got Away, and then regretfully left cause i was late to catch the next train)

so all in all, it was an amazing experience that i hope everyone gets the chance to enjoy at least once in their life, i made a ton of friends, managed not to have an anxiety attack (at least so far, but i'm feeling pretty good about everything) and i no longer have a voice, pretty much constant bi panic throughout everything but i'm not even mad about it. it was awesome. 10/10 would do again

(also peep my larry red string of fate concert shirt cause it got a decent amount of attention and i'm very proud of it)

hahahha! This is lovely. Thank you so much for sharing you show with us! I love the t-shirt. Sounds like a great time.

[fruitcoops]

Two of A Kind

I’ve been focusing on asks a lot lately because of everyone’s awesome ideas, but I saw a Cut video that was similar to this and just couldn’t resist. Hope you enjoy! Sweater Weather credit goes to @lumosinlove!

TW for mentions of sex and endless simping!

“Are you ready?” Marlene asks behind the camera. Kasey sits alone on a stool in the middle of the room, drumming his fingers on his knees.

“Yep. What am I doing again?”

The video cuts, revealing the same room, this time with James Potter on the stool. “You’re going to be answering a few questions,” Marlene explains. “And then we’re also going to be interviewing your wife and comparing your answers.”

“Oh, God,” James laughs. “Okay, hit me with your best shot.”

A title card appears on the screen. First Question: What was your first date?

Remus thinks for a moment. “Like, our first official date, or something that was definitely a date but we were both too dumb to notice?”

“Kasey took me to an ice rink,” Natalie says. She is inexplicably sitting on a folding chair rather than the stool. “We spent about three hours there, drinking cocoa and talking. It was a ton of fun!”

“Ice skating.” Kasey grins. “She told me she could skate, but she had never stepped on the ice in her life.”

“It was at Sid’s.” Sirius smiles to himself. “We had been together for about three months at that point.”

“Remus asked us to define ‘first date’,” Marlene says, sounding amused.

“Is there a different definition that I’m not aware of? We hung out at Sid’s a bunch before we actually got together, but those didn’t qualify as dates.” He pauses. “Looking back, they kind of were dates. We just didn’t know it.”

The video transitions to Lily and James, whose interviews are lined up side-by-side. “Lily took me to get ice cream after we went for a walk in the park,” James answers with a bright smile.

Lily laughs. “Our first date was a disaster. It was twenty-five degrees outside and we got ice cream. I think our brain freezes lasted about three straight minutes, but I had a great time.”

Second Question: When and where was your first kiss?

“Our first kiss happened on our first date,” Natalie says. “Kase caught me when I fell over and I just leaned right in.”

Kasey’s dopey smile makes his eyes crinkle. “At the ice rink. It felt like something out of a movie.”

Lily frowns in thought. “Oh, god, maybe our sixth date? He dropped me off at my apartment and kissed me goodnight.”

“I pulled a move straight from a John Hughes movie.” James grins and stretches his arms out. “Walked her to the door and everything. It was perfect.”

“Pascal Dumais’ basement,” Sirius says with a light laugh. “Which is a surprisingly romantic place.”

“It happened right after Sirius’ birthday party, which I was tricked into attending.” Remus gives the camera a mock-serious look. “Always be suspicious of Pascal Dumais. Always.”

Third Question: Who said ‘I love you’ first, and what was your reaction?

Sirius bites his lip. “I said it first, but only by two seconds. It was a long time coming, to be honest.”

“Sirius said it first.” Remus smiles at the memory. “We were both kind of wrecks at the time, but it was…amazing. I think I just cried harder and kissed him.”

Lily rolls her eyes fondly. “James said it first. We were both super drunk and he just blurted it out in the middle of the club.”

“She ran away!” James practically shouts as the video cuts to him. “I told her I loved her, she gave me this shocked look, and then disappeared! I get a text an hour later saying she caught a cab and went home, and she signs it with ‘love, Lily’. What the fuck was I supposed to do with that?”

Natalie coughs slightly. “Um, I don’t remember who said it first.”

Kasey grins at the camera. “Natalie said she didn’t remember,” Marlene calls.

“Oh, she remembers.”

Fourth Question: How’s your sex life? Anything you can do differently?

Sirius, who was taking a sip of water, chokes. “Excuse me?”

Remus is dead silent for a second, blinking at the camera in shock. “It’s, uh, good.”

“If we gave you some alcohol, would your answer change?” Marlene asks.

“Probably. Does anyone else feel like they’re suddenly in danger?”

“What sex life?” James snorts. “We have a baby. There is no time or energy for anything anymore.”

Lily raises an eyebrow. “You think I want him anywhere near me after I just shoved a baby out of my crotch?”

“It’s damn good.” Natalie winks, uncapping her own waterbottle. “Pro tip for anyone looking for a hockey boyfriend: go for the goalies. They’re flexible.”

Kasey is laughing into his hands when his interview appears. “She said that?” he manages. “Oh, Christ.”

Fifth Question: Do you dirty talk?

“Yes.” Kasey and Natalie say at the same time. James winks, and Lily shrugs with a sly smile.

Remus gives the camera crew a disbelieving look. “Are all the questions like this? Were we lulled into a false sense of security?”

“Answer the question, Loops!”

Remus sighs deeply. “On occasion, yes. I’m going to regret saying that.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Sirius says, narrowing his eyes as he sets his water down.

Sixth Question: How well do you sleep?

“Not bad,” Remus says. “Better than I used to, that’s for sure.”

“I don’t sleep,” Lily scoffs. James just looks at the camera and wordlessly gestures to the shadows under his eyes.

“Pretty well,” Natalie muses, slinging one arm around the back of her folding chair.

Sirius nods. “I’d say I sleep well most nights. It’s more comfortable with another person, which was surprising.”

Seventh Question: Why do you feel obligated to share a bed?

“Obligated?” Sirius and Remus say with matching tones of incredulity.

Lily’s smile becomes softer. “I really like sharing a bed. It makes me feel safe.”

“Oh, I love sleeping next to Lily.” James’ gaze turns dreamy. “She smells nice, she’s so warm, and sharing a bed makes childcare much easier when the other person is within reach.”

“You can’t tell her I said this, okay?” Kasey looks around at the camera crew before answering, and his cheeks turn light pink. “Nat’s side of the bed faces east, so if I get up for practice and the sun is rising, she glows a little bit. I dunno, I like it.”

“Kasey is really warm and cuddly.” Natalie says after a moment of thought. “He’s like my own personal heater and I’m never cold if he’s there. Don’t tell him I said that.”

Remus bites his lip before speaking. “I’m not much of a cuddler, but I sleep better next to Sirius than I ever have before. It’s incredible.”

Sirius cocks his head to the side with a smile. “Hmm. Having someone there to hold, especially someone I care about so much, is the best feeling. If I ever wake up in the middle of the night, he’s just…always there.” He half-shrugs. “It’s sappy, but it’s true.”

Eighth Question: Rate your attractiveness on a scale of 1-10

“Eleven,” Lily and Natalie say in unison, as if it’s obvious.

“I’m going with a solid six,” Remus decides after a moment’s deliberation.

“Eight, maybe?” Kasey answers.

Sirius makes a face. “Six? Seven?”

James is mid-laugh when the video cuts to him. “Um, seven. Lily and I have talked about this before and I got in trouble for saying ten, that’s why I’m laughing. Sorry.”

Ninth Question: Rate your partner’s attractiveness on a scale of 1-10

Not a single one hesitates. “Ten.”

“Remus said he was a solid six,” Marlene says as the camera focuses on Sirius.

His eyebrows shoot up. “What? Where is he? Re!”

“What?” a distant voice shouts back.

“You’re a ten!”

“On what scale?”

“Nat said eleven, didn’t she?” Kasey asks with a grin as the clip changes. “I love it when she does that.”

Final Question: What animal is your partner and why? Give three reasons.

Lily gives Marlene a hard look. “Marley, I love you, but what I say right now needs to stay confidential from my husband.”

Sirius laughs quietly. “Oh, he’s going to hate me for this.”

“Lily is a lioness,” James says immediately. “She’s strong, fierce, and unbelievably brave.”

Natalie tilts her head. “Good question. I’m going to go with a bear, since he’s got a big, tough reputation but he’s all soft inside. He’s a pretty solid guy, too, and he likes cold weather.”

“Nat is one of those really colorful birds,” Kasey says. “The ones with big personalities and the pretty feathers.”

“James is a lion.” Lily thinks for a moment longer. “It’s not just that he plays for the Lions, but he really is one of the bravest people I know. He’s protective of his family and cares a lot about keeping everyone together.”

Remus grins at the camera. “Sirius is a dog, and I will happily tell you why. Number one: he loves going for walks. Number two: he is endlessly loyal to the people he cares for. Number three: peanut butter.”

“So, Re is either a cat or a dog, and I really can’t choose.” Sirius’ eyebrows draw together in thought.

“You can choose both if you have reasons,” Marlene calls behind the camera.

“Really? Alright, he’s a dog because he’s friendly, loyal, and brings people trinkets as gifts. Um, I don’t have a legitimate reason for the cat one, but do any of you know that one vine with the cat that’s being dragged around on a leash?”

The camera crew bursts out laughing, and a small picture of the cat appears in the upper left of the screen.

“Anyone who has tried to pick Remus up knows that he looks exactly like that. Goes completely limp, it’s the funniest fucking thing.”

The video cuts to Remus, who raises his eyebrows. “He said what?”

The title card appears and Marlene’s voiceover begins. “Thanks for watching, Lions! Special thanks to Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, James and Lily Potter, Natalie Darcy, and Kasey Winter for being with us today. Like and subscribe for more!”

[tumbleweedmemes]

danny gonzalez sentence starter (part 3)

sentences from youtuber danny gonzalez’s videos and songs.

“i seriously have some really normal-looking nipples.”

“we all have that one friend that just... lies, all the time.”

“life is just one big fuckin’ mario kart.”

“there were severe thunderstorm warnings, there were severe hail warnings, and there were... about three or four tornado warnings.”

“the motivational speaker’s a fucking caveman.”

“yeah, can you come over? my kids aren’t eating their broccoli.”

“you don’t have to tell me every time you found a bounce here.”

“oh no! oh, damnit, this really ruined my whole day, my friend breakin’ his neck and shit.”

“that mouse seems... legitimately traumatized by what she’s done.”

“do you have any idea how hard it is to be an egg? no! you’ve never been an egg in your life!”

“next time i shatter, can you just let me die?”

“i don’t want a fridge with a personality.”

“from here on out, no more talking about adult rat content.”

“do i just have ‘nervous guy’ posture?”

“we stan an uncomfortable king.”

“oh my god, dude. these people are tearing me to shreds! i deserve it, too, that’s the worst part.”

“i’m so confident, i just fell asleep.”

“i’m so confident, i’m just bored all the time.”

“is this a current photo? are you three years old?”

“wow, that’s awesome, this is really fucked-up!”

“there’s also caution tape all over the walls and a danger sign on the front door of his room... which is kinda considerate, actually.”

“ow! fuckin’ bitch-ass crab! ugh!”

“this does not look like the type of place you would wanna go to find love, this looks like a fedex.”

“ROCK IT, BABY, YEAH!”

“do you think they got married? or do you think they’re both dead?”

“they kind of look like they were drawn by a fourth grader, so i don’t know what’s up with that.”

“you try to stay away from... water?”

“if i get too close to water, i might forget how to act, shit.”

“nah, they’re just brittle in the mornings. usually they harden around lunchtime, and at night... they get squishy.”

“i have superpowers... i can’t go to school anymore, i gotta go home.”

“they give off some pretty strong ‘we kill mermaid’ vibes.”

“haha! got your head! you’re not going anywhere now, missy!”

“i’m sorry, man, you’re grounded as fuck.”

“ugh, okay, fine, i’ll help you cure your stupid bone thing.”

“we actually have a game of marco polo planned for the rest of time, so i can’t cure cancer, sorry, i know.”

[venhedish]

In light of a certain wincest-adjacent blocklist making the rounds and some friends of mine getting smacked with the purity hammer, I have things to say for anyone who would like to listen!

In my experience, antis are more concerned with the rush they get from being angry and feeling morally superior than they are with actually engaging critically with us, the text, or themselves to understand why they feel the way they feel.

This is not actually about the incest thing and it never has been. Incest in the SPN fandom is being used as a dog-whistle to draw a dividing line between us and them, and it’s that shitty black-and-white thinking that tons of young people are falling victim to because it’s wrapped up with a bow that presents a neat little package: incest bad. We can all agree on that, can’t we? But what’s so insidious is that this new-Victorian purity movement is only cloaked in a signifier of moral purity. What it actually is is a giant, authoritarian flag waving in the air, inviting the anti-intellectual to join together behind a concept that sounds righteous on the surface but is actually being used to bully, harass, and harm people who are often already marginalized out of their own communities.

One thing to look out for in particular that absolutely fascinates me is the way language is used as an exclusionary, self-selective force that reinforces these boundaries. Go to any one of the big heller/anti-wincest blogs and look at the way they talk to each other. To be clear, almost all groups will eventually start developing a shorthand that makes them easily identifiable to each other, but sometimes I’ll check out that side of tumblr and legitimately feel like we’re speaking two different languages.

This is a really common thing that happens with political and religious movements and it’s happening here for similar reasons! If you’re on the fringes of fandom and you like destiel and you join tumblr or twitter or wherever these communities are active and you do a search for your ship, you’ll find some blogs that seem really cool and have interesting stuff to say, but they’re full of in-jokes and weird terms and meme language. And because you want to fit in—to understand the community you’re joining—you dive deeper, you search back through history and pick up pieces here and there until you finally get it. And by that point, you’ve basically indoctrinated yourself. You’re doing their work for them, essentially.

This kind of thing is done on purpose for two reasons: it helps to signify that people using this language have passed a litmus test that proves this person is one of us, and it makes it harder for the outsider to engage with you on even footing. I mean, this sounds fucking ridiculous, but how the fuck is an intellectually honest person supposed to engage critically with someone who attacks them by calling them J*red-kin??? (I just made that up but I can 100% imagine a heller using it as an insult). I’m not saying this is done on purpose in the SPN fandom. I mean, maybe a little by people who are shit-stirring on purpose, but this kind of thing just happens and it’s very hard to catch on to. We’re all guilty of it. Language is crazy flexible and always shifting and we flex and shift with it as popular phrases come and go.

Look, all I’m saying is that if you actually think about the response to wincest from the heller community, you realize how flimsy their platform really is. Reading and writing about fictional brothers fictionally fucking each other harms no one, and anyone with a brain who actually cares knows this! That’s why the anti-wincest crowd isn’t citing articles or research about the dangers of portraying incest in fiction – because they don’t exist! We can, of course, talk about the impact that uneven power dynamics in real life incestuous relationships have on victims of such abuse, how most people who are sexually abused are abused by a family member, how to be aware of grooming techniques and watch out for red flags that point towards abusive behavior. But we don’t! Because that’s 👏 not 👏 what 👏 it’s 👏 about 👏

Instead, it’s just an overflowing bandwagon jammed full of empty ideas and a lot of people getting hurt because of it. Innocent – let me say it again: INNOCENT people who are exploring sexuality, trauma, relationship dynamics, and just plain old having a good time minding their own business in an ethically safe and victimless way are being threatened and harassed and told to die. Wonder which one is actually more damaging and morally bankrupt. 🤔

Anyway, imagine a world where the purity police got their way. There’d basically be no safe literature left. Nabokov? Cancelled. Rushdie? Salinger? Ginsberg? All cancelled. Imagine antis whole-cloth discarding hundreds of years of religious tradition because of all the shit the gods got up to! This is the same line of thinking that made a generation of moms believe that violent video games led to real-world violence. Fiction has never, ever, been meant to only tell pure stories. The whole world of literature would be narrowed down to, like, a couple cautionary tales and picture books if anti culture could somehow actually reach the inevitable praxis of its desire. 

Taboos have always been sexy. It’s okay to explore them through the medium of fiction. It’s literally the safest, most ethically responsible thing you can do. Please, please don’t let a functionally illiterate hive-mind convince you otherwise!

For an amazing resource to learn more about anti culture and how troubling it is, check out @freedom-of-fanfic. It’s an awesome blog to browse if you’re even a tiny bit interested in this kind of thing!