#like it wasn't my fav but i wouldn't viscerally hate it

[numbknee]

this isn’t a new hot take of mine but it still blows my MIND that I’m in the minority in the kyman fandom when it comes to thinking of Kyle as a dom/top and Cartman as a sub/bottom. From what I’ve heard from veteran kymans the fandom barely had ANY sub Cartman truthers in its earlier years, and dom Cartman is still extremely popular to this day. There's so much art/fics where Kyle is like... a pain slut (????) or gagging for Cartman’s giant dick (?????????) but any time I see that stuff I get a visceral, skin-crawling HELL FUCKING NO 😬😬😬 reaction and have to back out immediately.

A mutual once told me something like “I can’t write Cartman as a dom, I think I’d break out in hives or something” and that’s p much exactly how I feel lmao 😆

y'all do you ig, but it's not my cup of tea at all.

[bohemian-nights]

I’m not team black or green, and I’m also only watching this show for nettles - but I have to say that the only racist comments I see are coming from team black. They are so racist it’s insane.

1. They treat the velaryons like Rhaenyra & her (white) son’s cheer squad . They can’t fathom the velaryons being their own people with their own thoughts and opinions.

2. Their treatment of vaemond. They justify his murder for daring to speak up against their fav. They gaslight anyone who supports vaemond’s right to be angry that his house is being stolen by a white kid and claim that Luke “legally” isn’t a bastard and that we are misogynistic.

3. Their treatment of laena - they either claim that she was Rhaenyra’s lesbian (?) lover or that daemon never cared about her - they refuse to acknowledge that daemon was happily in love with her.

4. Their treatment of nettles.

I’m so done. I’ve just had a conversation with one of those insane stans, and they said that I’m “playing the victim” for pointing out their racism. I’m so sick and tired of hearing that I’m “playing the victim” or that I’m being “over dramatic” for wanting actual black representation and calling out performative activism.

Team Green has its moments(I don’t love how some of them treat Nettles), but Team Black is indeed objectively worse.

I have yet to see any other sub-fanbase go on rants about how there are too many Black people on the show so it’s fine to cut the only in-canon Black character(Nettles), that they are glad the n-word died(Laena), claim that a Black woman’s Afro-hair is dirty(the leaked photo on the beach), calling people monkeys(again Laena), comparing characters to animals(Laena and Nettles), the legally biracial fiasco, denying that there is racism in the books and that their fave is one of the perpetrators, saying that Daemon sleeping with Black women is a detrimental character trait…It’s a mess.

Honestly, most of the viscerally racist stuff that has been said had been geared toward Nettles or Laena(Vaemond’s a close third) because they are perceived as a threat.

Which shows you how f*cked up these people are. They are legitimately willing to resort to racism to attack fictional characters over a fictional ship.

And the kicker is, they don’t see anything wrong with their behavior because: I’m not racist. I have no problem with good Black people(aka the ones who kiss up to my fave), ignore me saying how a white woman (who I hate cause she's a Green 🥦, but she's still white) with less plot development is somehow more relevant than the girl who shows that you are more than the blood in your veins. That's not relevant. You wouldn't like her if she wasn't Black!

Let's not get into the fact that they only like Baela, Rhaena, Corlys, and Alyn because they haven't/don't do anything. The moment we see them have a personality and it’s not solely about worshipping Missy Anne they'll turn on them.

If the show ends Rhaena’s arc marrying a Hightower they'll call her a whore and a traitor. If Baela calls out Missy Anne for not being motherly towards her and her sister they'll call her ungrateful. When Corlys puts his blood first he’ll be treated just like Ser Vaemond. Alyn will be hated not for saving the psychotic white woman(who arrested his father and tried to arrest his brother) in her hour of need.

If what they said about Rhaena taking Nettles’ place actually happened, do you know how upset they'd actually be with Daemon even putting his actual child first before Miss Maegor? She'd become enemy #1. He is not allowed to love anyone more than her.

They also love to defend their deplorable behavior by saying the characters they are attacking are fictional so it doesn’t matter.

B*tch it’s no longer just fictional when you call someone(even if it’s a fictional character) the n-word.

When you are actively trying to take away what little representation we do have and hurling slurs and stereotypes used against Black people in real life for centuries to attack characters you don’t like, you’ve gone past fiction and gone straight into a Klan rally.

There is loads of evidence of their demented behavior. Anyone with a working brain knows they aren’t right in the head and what they are saying is wrong.

Hell, they themselves know what they are saying is f*cked up, which is why they try to gaslight you into believing they are the innocent victims and you've just lost your mind. When that doesn't work and you provide them with the receipts for their bullcrap it’s crickets cause they’ve gone crying in the corner 🦗

They keep crying and bemoaning about Miss Maegor being called a whore. That isn't exactly nice, but you can't flip things around and make yourself look like the injured party when you are a f*cking racist.

For Christ's sake, these people are just all-around hypocrites. Some of them have called Nettles a whore(the worst is yet to come with her) yet they spaz out when you say Miss Maegor and start yelling about misogyny.

They are the same ones who mocked Laena dying(and her son) yet they cry when you call a dragon baby a lizard.

You can't claim that it's all fiction and then start crying when your fave who is also fictional is “attacked.”

There is a good reason she's being “attacked” considering she's an awful character with next to zero redeeming qualities(which is probably why she's attracted the worst fanbase).

You can't claim misogyny and perpetrate it yourself. You can't claim to not be a racist and then overtalk Black women when they call you out on your behavior and then call them crazy for defending themselves. You can't force Black women to overlook your faves racism for the sisterhood and then spit in our faces when we don't. That's not how this works.

I could go on, but I'm going to stop here cause it's pointless. You just have to laugh and bow out cause talking to them is like talking to a brick wall.

[thebrightestlodge]

I'm currently watching Mandy because I recall you really liked it, and it's so cool to recognize so many details I find in your art and Godcleaver! It makes it even more interesting! If you feel inspired to say some things that you found particularly inspiring, I do want to hear! But you don't have to! I just wanted to thank you for making me discover this movie!

I must warn, it isn't even a "I really like it". It's a "rewired me on a level to the point of it's jsut my world". I'm glad it can be recognized as a huge influence! It's my fav movie so it's very near and dear to me, I have two old art pieces for it I did even (I might recolour the first pic and redraw the second). I'm glad you discovered it! It's really underrated for sure.

As for inspiration? Putting it under a read more because it will be insanely rambling and spoilers but know this is like ...a movie that is so important to me and IS me

There's a lot to the film that really speaks to what you see in my art. Music being it's own breathing heaving beast, a silent participant in the plot. The use of violent visceral colours like I'm staring at a bruise under blacklight that scratches such specific parts of the brain that frames this in an alien way, even if it's "the real world". Characters not being bad got being rightously angry and it drives them to the point of frenzy.

Dead wife/sad man stories are incredibly boring but something about this really spins the framing to the point I wouldn't even say it's one of those movies. Mandy is so fleshed out and important. We know who she is, we know she's had an incredibly horrible life before we met her/she met Red, but even with it, we see the sort of quiet cool person she is. She's someone we want to know. Dead partners in movies are so bland that we really in a way can't figure why we want to avenge them. We FEEL for her, we know who she is so the weight of her dead hits harder than anything. The death scene is incredible too, where it's jsut the throbbing synth, no sounds beyond that. We the the sleeping bag shaking and thrashing and we know what's happening, but nothing is ever exploitative on her part. We view the scene through the spectators and all their winding emotions, from Red's horror, the cultist's glee, the young girl, and Jeremiah's silent anguish and hate.

Mandy's dream sequence and the scene of ehr and Red talking of the starlings, another visit into these characters worlds, says so much without forcing a backstory. Red is almost an interesting foil here. We have just enought to figure what sort of character he is. He maybe was military/para-military and he has a drinking issue (by the scenes of him refusing a beer and him looking in the bathroom for a secret vodka bottle). He's a blank enough slate though that it let's us get to be the ones to experience Mandy. He truly loves and cares for her and we get to feel it because in how he is written and how scenes between them are shot, we ARE Red, with our own issues brought in.

Now to the meat of this situation. Mandy's death really is what makes the movie special because in how it's written and even stated by Panos Cosmatos himself, she IS the film. When Mandy dies, we no longer exist in our world. Mandy has moved into a another plane. She is Galactus and has devoured our world and we live in hers. The movie's sharp grinding as we start to peak into the phantasmagorical horror shifts because Mandy is being affected. When she gets high, everything is warped. When she dies, plots are set in motion.

My aggressive belief is when Red tastes the Biker's swill, Mandy takes him over. Not to say Red wasn't first motivated in revenge! He's the one to seek out his old friend and his weapon, he forges The Beast, he drives out to fight the bikers. We see though in the face of all this, he's jsut so emotional about it. His haunting response after Mandy dies, stumbling into the house and then the howling and chugging in the bathroom. When he's chained up and nailed to the floor in the house the bikers take over, he's jsut sobbing. Even fighting those two bikers, he all mania and emotion tearing them up. The moment he tastes the swill though? Something shifts. When he faces the main biker, there's no emotion, jsut quiet stalking, until the mention of "SHE'S ...STILL ...BURNING!"

Theory continues, we see Mandy in visions from Red, these nightmare shots of her rotting away, her adrift in the lake we see them in in the beginning, and extracting a jewel from an animal's corpse. It's like she speaks from whatever void she has now taken. The book Mandy reads is made for the movie, BUT I managed to track the fake cover. A story of a man stealing the power of witches stolen from a she-wyrm. A lone female warrior trudges to stop him. Fits the theory enough. When Red finds the Chemist, inferred to the the creator of the sludge, the way he speaks to Red is interesting. We don't have enough fo Red's character to know, but we have enough of Mandy's to make this scene interesting.

Chemist: Jovan Warrior, sent forth from the eye of the storm

-Mandy mentions in the beginning of her favourite planet being Jupiter, especially because of the eternal storms. Jove was one of the many names of the Roman god Jupiter.

Chemist: Oh man, they wronged you! Why they gotta be like that? You exude a cosmic darkness ...

-This is definitely inference because, as said, it's not like Red can't experience this, but it's so pointed. Mandy, destroyed by this cult that saw something in her, and the starling story, and the dream of the dead deer fetus. Something in her sits, dark and heavy, like the music tracks.

Red does not speak this whole time, but the Chemist talks as if there's conversation. The Chemist, so shot into another existence, maybe he IS talking with Mandy, on another level we can't comprehend. He sees the folding of worlds

When we go to find the cultists, another interesting thing comes up. The one cultist who never really comes off as feeling purposeful and involved is the young girl. The one who is willing to let Jeremiah blow her head off, the one he calls for after being upset about seeing Mandy. When Red kills Swan, the girl just watches. Mandy did see her there and maybe a kindred spirit of sorts, two people violently affected by events then and now in their lives. Maybe it's because she wasn't as malicious, who knows. Maybe it's Mandy who spares.

And finally, the last confrontation ...

In a way, I think Mandy killed Jeremiah first. His seduction and obsession, trying to impress her. Mandy is sent ROCKETING with how high she is and the scene where he speaks with ehr, their faces constantly melded, some sort of different thing is happening. Sure it's style for the movie and perhaps I can't put into words, but "You're a special one, Mandy" has meaning here. When he finally sheds his coat and is front of her, naked and showing her whatever he thinks passes for the divine, she laughs. It's a chuckle into a laugh into a cackling furious howl, ebcause we're seeing she's knowing she's pissing him off ow. This moment, he's crushed in front of his constant followers. He's embarrassed. In the spirit, I think he dies here, it's the first time someone tells him no and ridicules him.

In our final confrontation, it's the first time since the sludge, we hear him speak. A garbled, laid-over second voice

"The psychotic drowns ...while the mystic swims ...

You're drowning. I'm swimming."

When ahd our last Mandy dream already happen. Mandy taking a jewel from some great beast. This is the final act of revenge, killing the last monster. Jeremiah's desperation to make it up, but there's no emotion facing this, no mania or sadness. Red crushes his head, the garbling speaking

"I am your god now"

The movie ends with Red driving off. We see Mandy next to him in the Camaro and we see a vision. A shot of teh first time they met. And with all we know and all we've seen, this is finally the end. The manic iconic grin of Red looking to her as we driveoff into this alien fantasy landscape. The final bit of the film stating they are reborn into this carnal new world. They become one here finally.

And I mean, you can add your trans narratives in here, or even just state they are trans. Something about the total take of bodies, two sharing in one body, being whatever you choose to headcanon them as. I don't remember the thoughts I had on this, will edit when I remember, but I think it's a very trans film.

We're swallowed into this world of Mandy's. I know Red wears the Tiger shirt but I think Lizzie represents Mandy more. The tiger set loose into the Pacific Northwest is jsut what it is. We're watching her and Red's love become one huge angry beast, their love isn't corrupted. A frenzy and compassion and caring between two broken people that becomes so ravenous after this trauma, it takes chunks out of this world and rebuilds it, sharpens its fangs so it can devour the violators who encroached. A winding grizzled thing that pulses like the beatof the soundtrack. I jsut think it's a cool movie, sorry for any tangents or my being incoherent when talking about it.

Stream this, sound of the summer