#no offense to gabriel fans

[yolowritter]

In Defense of Gabriel Agreste

Oh dear Kwami, I can't believe I'm actually doing this... I can't believe that it feels necessary. Before we begin, I want to make a huge clarification. I am NOT supporting any of Gabriel's actions AT ALL, especially anything done in Season 5. That's abuse, that's child neglect, that's grounds for calling CPS. I will never excuse that kind of thing, and frankly this isn't what I'm here to talk about. I simply want to state my opinion on how canon has absolutely ruined Gabriel as a character, and give my own perspective on our local supervillain, including an understanding of his reasons and how Gabriel devolves the way he does in the actual show. This is a mixture of headcannons I've had that are somewhat supported by canon, and I hope you all enjoy my little analysis piece.

First off, let's kick things into high gear by discussing Gabriel's themes. From the get-go of Bubbler, it's blindingly obvious that he serves as the "strict parent" antagonist to Adrien's quest for freedom and self-expression. As an archetype, this works quite well in a lot of stories and media, so I was fine with it when I watched the episode. Through the rest of Season 1, we quickly come to realize that Adrien's mother (and Gabriel's wife) is "missing", due to some reason or the other. At this point some may suspect his relation to Hawkmoth, but there's no legitimate evidence to go off of so we put a pin on that. During Simon Says, specifically Chat Noir and Gabriel's little interaction, we get to see that Adrien does hold some repressed anger against Gabriel because of how overprotective the man is, and then comes the fond remark of Emilie's flair for dramatics. It's a line so many of us have discussed or used in fanworks, but rarely do I see people talk about how Gabriel delivers it. The usually stoic personification of dissapointment seems to finally have some emotion in his voice, for the first really important moment of his character. Combine this with the earlier talk between him and Ladybug, where he praises Adrien and seems genuinely proud of his son for keeping up with all the activities/modeling/etc. Therefore, we get a good general idea of who Gabriel Agreste actually is. A grieving father who has lost his partner to "mysterious circumstances", and is trying to protect his son from any kind of harm. Sure, he's going about it the wrong way and is definately overdoing it, but the act itself doesn't come from a place of malice. Keep this in mind as we move forward.

In Season 2, we start off with the episode Collector. And learn that Gabriel is Hawkmoth. Because of course he is, Adrien is one of the titular characters in the show, naturally the writers want to pull a Luke Skywalker at some point. "I am your father" and all that, we've seen it a million times before. Still, this brings up the question of why? Sure, Gabriel is an asshole. That's very obvious by this point, even though we don't have enough information to truly cast judgement on his reasoning for such behavior. But there's a significant gap between "overprotective single parent who stifles their child" and "local butterfly man who has beef with teenage superheroes". Therefore, this reveal immediately has alarm bells ringing as to what Gabriel's motive is. In a later episode, we have the Gorizilla Incident. And this is where he finally becomes a much more complex, much better character! Because Hawkmoth has captured Ladybug. She's right there, helpless, and all he has to do is either show up and steal her Miraculous, or just wait until she loses her transformation and then take the earrings. His arch nemesis, the person who has been preventing him from accomplishing whatever his goals are...is at his mercy. But...there's a problem. His son is also on the field of battle, and just jumped off a building. Wonderful! Without the slightest bit of hesitation, Gabriel releases Ladybug, therefore saving Adrien's life at the cost of the Miraculous. And much later, during Queen Wasp, Hawkmoth genuinely ponders if he's done more harm than good by trying to defeat the Heroes of Paris. (Side Note: I don't actually remember if we'd seen Emilie in the pod by this point, but whatever.) He would have quit, hung up the suit, and lived out his days as Gabriel Agreste. Miserably maybe, but he would have stuck to that choice. No more Hawkmoth. Until...he gets the chance to Akumatize a Miraculous Holder. And if you want to rewatch this scene, notice the mania in Gabriel's eyes. This extreme emotional reaction is the complete opposite of what we've seen from the man so far (dramatic monologues aside), and the chance at victory rips Gabriel's sanity away from him. Cue Queen Wasp, and later Scarlet Moth.

But I want to stick to this moment for a second. Queen Wasp takes place directly after Style Queen, in which Adrien gets turned into a gold statue. And sure, the show can tell us all it wants about how "he's been turned to dust" or some bs, but we all know Adrien is dead right now. And Gabriel knows it too. This is literally the reason why he tries to convince himself that he shouldn't be Hawkmoth anymore. Because he finally understands what kind of harm he's been doing. By this point it's like the 3rd time that Adrien is in immediate proximity to an Akuma and promptly gets bodied by said Villain, specifically because of Hawkmoth. I do not care what Season 5 says, Gabriel Agreste loved his son with every last shred in that broken, shattered fragment of a heart that was left after Emilie's death, and he shows it very clearly on multiple occassions. He even tries to connect with Adrien again, and has a genuine moment when they watch Emilie's movie together. Gabriel, for all his supervillainy and prancing about in a butterfly costume, seems to be healing throughout Season 2. So why does it only get worse from here?

Well...this is where my headcanons come in to fill the void. Obviously I could go on a tangent about the writers here, but I don't care enough to waste my breath on that again. Swiftly moving past that, I honestly think Gabriel suffers from Tunnel Vision during this show. And yeah that's not a "condition", but think about this for a second. Nooroo warns that there are terrible consequences for misusing a Miraculous in Origins, and the show...never follows up on this? Well, that's weird. Unless the consequences are mental. A deterioration of the self, in a way. Consider: a good portion of the fandom already talks about Gabriel and Hawkmoth/Shadowmoth/Monarch as different people sometimes. What if that's literal? What if that's the consequence? Gabriel was depressed, desperate and heartbroken after Emilie's demise, but according to a cutscene from Miraculous Rise of the Sphynx (and I swear to God why didn't they put this in the actual show???) Gabriel and Nathalie actually spent around a year looking for the Ladybug and Cat Miraculous before deciding to use the Butterfly. It was Gabriel's last resort. And look at how Hawkmoth acts in Season 1. He's...well, he's acting. Playing the role of a villain to lure them out and defeat them, knowing full-well (at least after Stoneheart) that Ladybug can fix pretty much anything he destroys if she wins, and he can just do the same if she's defeated. Gabriel has a safety net, he's acting the part of an evil villain, complete with dramatic monologues and "curse you Perry the Platypus" moments after ever defeat. Then in Season 2, he knows the jig is up. The stakes are too high and this Hawkmoth bs is hurting the one piece of Emilie that he has left...so Gabriel decides to quit.

And this is where the corruption comes in. During "Feast" in Season 3, Hawkmoth re-states his goal of "taking all the Miraculous!" Uh...hold on just a second. Didn't Gabriel only need the Ladybug and Cat? Yes, exactly. That's why the events of the show even happen to begin with. So why has it now changed to all the Miraculous, if the rest are useless in terms of bringing Emilie back? Well, Gabriel's thirst for power is slowly corrupting his mind. Hawkmoth is officially in control by this point, and it gets much, much worse from here. With Mayura at his side, Hawkmoth has a real person to care about, and take care of. Nathalie supports him, keeps Gabriel afloat in this ocean of despair that they're both slowly drowning in.

But what happens when Mayura can't be there anymore? What happens when Gabriel (now as Shadowmoth) spends hours upon hours inside that dark lair, deliberating his victory? It becomes his sole focus. What tiny specks of humanity were still left inside of this hollow shell called Gabriel Agreste have been devoured by a beast that hungers for only one thing. Power. Emilie is no longer loved by him, barely even remembered to begin with. Now instead of genuine heartbreak over his wife's loss, Shadowmoth is using her as an excuse to keep going. He rationilizes it all to himself, saying "this is for my family" and "they will understand" to hide from the very obvious fact that neither Emilie or Adrien would ever stand for this. His ambitions have stripped Gabriel of all sense and sanity, leaving behind a madman simply wearing his skin. The last time we ever see even a flicker of clarity in his head is during Glaciator 2.0, when Adrien is about to be Akumatized. But this is also the biggest indication that it's almost too late for Gabriel, because has to think about it. Sure, he doesn't actually Akumatize Adrien, but even since Chat Blanc it's become perfectly clear that he can and will go through with that to get an advantage over Ladybug. Here, Shadowmoth considered Akumatizing him anyway, even with just the usual chances of winning.

And in Ephemeral (I'm pretty sure, could be just before or after), Nooroo's worst fears have finally come to pass. Gabriel affirms that he wants to destroy the entire world using the Wish. And then re-shape it into one where he's the top dog, by extension making the Agrestes like the Supreme. Gabriel has gone completely off the rails by this point. I'd even argue that the person he was only a few months ago (don't get me started on that timeline btw) is dead. Gone, burried six feet under along with his wife, because Gabriel Agreste would never do something like this. Monarch just makes everything even worse, especially with Evolution. Just like Nathalie said, he had the perfect chance to warn his past self about the Peacock being broken. Step in the portal, detransform, explain that he's Gabriel, then tell them "hey so the recipe to fix it is on this page of the Grimoire, you need to do this before Emilie makes Adrien" and that's it. But he just ignores it completely because of his obsession, hence proving the point I'm trying to make.

To circle back to the beginning of this post, I am perfectly fine with how Gabriel's character devolves and spirals into madness across the show. It's a cool plotline, could have been really interesting if the writers bothered to explore it but even with only what we have, I'd say it adds a ton of depth to his character! Or...would, if they bothered to explain this! Like seriously, you can pretty easily infer than something of the sort is happening, especially in later seasons. Just give Nathalie or Nooroo one or two scenes where they are worried about Gabriel going insane! Especially Nooroo, give the poor guy a few lines trying to warn Shadowmoth like "Master, please! You need to think about what you're doing! Can't you see this isn't you anymore?" or something of the sort. Sure, it doesn't have to be so on the nose, but you get my point! Instead they did nothing with this amazing idea that's already there because they wrote it by accident! And guess what? Gabriel goes from a sympathetic villain in Season 2 to an utter maniac who locks his "beloved" son in an insane asylum during Season 5!

Like are you kidding me??? What alternate universe did I get dropped into where this is the "logical" followup to Hawkmoth's storyline? One of the only things Gabriel even had going for him in terms of complexity was his genuine love towards Adrien! And like I said, I'd be fine if this how they wanted to make things and play the "tragic villain consumed by a lust for power" card! For Nooroo's sake, it's dangling right in front of them like a carrot on a stick! But instead of making the slightest bit of effort and explain that this is happening, or that it's an intentional plotpoint for Gabriel's character, their innaction just reduces him to a one-dimensional "evil because he's the villain" cardboard cutout! Believe me, I love unapologetically evil characters, who do the worst things for funsies! But Gabriel Agreste can never be that type of bad guy because you set up an entire storyline about his poor wife who died because adoption is apparently illegal in this universe! Don't get me started on Emilie Agreste, she's getting a rant of her own soon enough! But come on, would it kill you to at least try and give your villains some depth???

Thomas, do you want me to have a stroke? An aneurysm? To keel over dead like Gabriel's character development? Should I maybe put a fridge in my basement for good measure? And do not talk to me about the "tell Adrien how good a father I was" bs the finale had in it! Just- just don't touch that with a ten foot pole! But...I will admit, there is a very interesting direction they can take Gabriel's character now that he's dead. Because sure, he's now a one-dimensional asshole that screamed in his basement a lot before beating up a cat(bug)girl and dropping dead, but hey! Gabriel Agreste can haunt the narrative now! Have Lila use reunion to talk to him! Have Marinette be tormented by the stupid promise she made! Have Adrien be conflicted over how Gabriel treated him! Give us an existential crisis because "the hero who defeted Monarch" doesn't match up with the abusive asshole Adrien has known for the past year! Gabriel Agreste's character has been utterly trainwrecked by the writers' refusal to explain anything about him beyond a superficial "boo hoo my wife keeled over". Yeah buddy, so what? You can at least be interesting about it!

Anyway, I'm going to go cool off and make another draft for how to fix this idiot's character development. Or you know, give him some in the first place because he's lost it all. I'll see you all soon with an "In offense to Emilie Agreste" post, but until then, Stay Miraculous everyone!

[dizzying-faust]

I saw someone do a Guilty Gear shipping tierlist and thought I would put myself into the ring.

[ilikekidsshows]

Sorry for jumpin your ask box like this. Marinette stans are... a pest to say the least and I wanna rant here because this seems to be like a save space. When I say it here my frustration can't cause trouble for me or anyone else.

I don't care anymore if people say I'm just a stupid salter who hates Marinette, I don't think this show will ever be able to undo the absolute fucking hypocrisy that is Marinette de-transforming and trusting an as good as defeated Gabriel like an absolute damn MORON

When 6 episodes earlier Adrien had to apologize in shame for 'having caused Marinette's disadvantage' against Lila in the class when HE literally still doesn't even know about what happened in the damn bathroom, but Marinette for damn sure KNOWS that Gabriel is an insane and sadistic abuser and terrorist!

And of course Marinette fans are bending over BACKWARDS to talk their way outta acknowledging any kinda truth one could be upset about. Saying that it's not the same cause Marinette is 14 (like Adrien and everyone else, too??!) and is, like, the purest and most wonderful but horrifically abused and misunderstood person who ever existed and that Gabriel not having taken Marinette's generous (empty) offer was totally just Gabriel betraying her pure and angelic heart that tried to do the right thing like the hero she is because 'she's so pure that she was able to see the good in him and wanted to give him another chance 😌'

When, what the hell?? Adrien was and IS being ripped to SHREDS for so much less cause of Chameleon! Just because Marinette couldn't ever confront Lila in a way that goes beyond "point finger and scream and then get upset when that doesn't work for 5 seasons straight"! There is NOTHING anyone can claim that makes the hypocrisy here make sense. Nothing. Didn't she just 'lovingly' patronize Adrien by saying that "sometimes the good we see in other people is only a reflection of our own goodness" and he had to act grateful that she's still able to love him despite his naivety and wrongness?? That was 6 episodes ago! Marinette, where did that energy go now that it's YOU?

Adrien had to 'learn his lesson' in shame and be reprimanded for a good moral advice he couldn't possibly know would backfire because he unknowingly said it about the show's most evil psychopath apparently

But Marinette can seemingly be the most gullible, hypocritical, and illogical moron on the planet, detransforming for no god damn reason in front of the not entirely disarmed and dying mass terrorist, abuser, and magical enslaver who's about to fail and loose everything he ever loved and fought for

But SURE, she totally didn't do Adrien's 'offense' from season 3 just 1000x WORSE, cause, didn't you know? It's ✨Marinette!✨

Her flaws don't matter. In fact, anyone who says she is capable of REAL flaws apparently just mindlessly hates her and strong female characters like her. She can do everything everyone else gets dragged to hell for cuz fuck everyone and everything I guess! Mademoiselle center of the universe might be sad if morality applies to her.

At least if they'd SAY IT that they are okay with pathetic double standards and hypocrisy, but no. Everyone is acting like they're on the moral high-horse by just ignoring everythin that doesn't make Marinette look like the greatest person ever, because it's ✨Marinette✨and we're just mean haters who "don't get it". I sure get that Marinette's fans' and especially STANS' words have lost as good as all validity in my eyes starting with the retooling season 4 because of how incapable of basic self-reflection they seem to be!

btw, I didn't talk to them in this tone. I just wanted to have a conversation with people who say that they think the Marinette and Adrien situations are different and I get nothin but unfiltered hypocrisy and excuses upon excuses! It's just "Adrien was WRONG because Marinette was RIGHT!" with "Marinette was RIGHT but Gabriel was such an awful person to HER that he unfairly punished her pure heart of justice™! 🥺"

Like, get the hell out man. How is any discours supposed to ever exist again after all this??

I apologize again for intruding, I needed to get this off my chest. I still wish you a great day and thanks for providing a place for group therapy 😅

---

Marinette stans love to claim that any consequences for her actions is Marinette being “punished”. They’ve been crying and throwing up about “Marinette getting punished for things that aren't her fault” ever since the original pre-retool series. Even when there's no character to point an accusing finger at, they claim that the writers are punishing her whenever she doesn't get away with something scot free or gets minorly inconvenienced by anything. The idea that Marinette having anything less than a perfect day with every character worshiping her is the same as her getting “punished” has been the basic toxic Marinette stan’s creed for years.

I'm also just going to be really mean: all of Marinette’s good traits that the stans repeat are wildly exaggerated from traits every non-villainous character has. Because, if we take their claims literally, I certainly don't see this “pure heart of justice” and “always helping others” the stans claim she does, because she's too busy moping about or chasing Adrien whenever she's on screen to have the time to help people as much as her stans claim she does. She sometimes helps her friends and family and she saves Akuma victims cause that's her job, but so much more of her life is taken up by worrying about herself.

She's also not strong, physically or mentally. She is not secretly jacked and she has never gotten out of a stressful situation victorious without someone else there to prop her up first. In terms of these things, Marinette is average, “just a normal girl with a normal life”. Marinette isn't weak exactly, but any other “good” member of the cast is the same. She’s not exceptional in these things, but the stans love to claim she’s the greatest, purest, goodest thing that was ever spawned into existence in the world of Miraculous. I know the phrase “strong female character” lost any meaning long ago, but it’s kinda laughable we’re at the point where explicit failures like the season 5 finale are being touted around as signs of strength.

I also agree that the Miraculous fandom just can't handle discourse anymore. Some time ago I saw a post that had someone wondering why there weren't many new analysis posts in the fandom post-season 5 and the reason for that is that the fandom doesn't have space for that kind of analytical thinking anymore. The analysts saw what SentiAdrien would do to the series and, when the fandom exploded into the expected abuse apologia, they left. In addition to that the series can no longer withstand any kind of analytical viewing so the remaining, highly defensive fandom is against questioning what they're watching. You can't enjoy this show if you employ any kind of critical thinking, because the morals the writers elevate are rancid.

Marinette stans have always been like this. I've never been harrassed by Chloé stans and I used to post some very spicy stuff about Chloé. Every time I've been harrassed in this fandom, it was done by Marinette stans. The more toxic Marinette stans have always been the worst part of this fandom and now that the writers are pandering to them, they're really bold about pushing everyone else around.

[crow-talks-hockey]

alright. haven't done one of these in a while. here's my top players in each area. (not just this season, but CONSISTENTLY the best in said area)

goal scoring: auston matthews. this one really shouldn't be hard to answer i mean, come on.

points: connor mcdavid, but some others i think are close depending on the season. good point getting is going to come from his play no matter what though.

well-roundedness: nathan mackinnon; he's an excellent passer, scorer, play maker. just all around such a top tier player. both physical and speedy. he is THE blend

defense: cale makar. another obvious one lol. he's just generational. you can't stop him.

goaltending: i'm going to go with andrei vasilevskiy still. just consistent and reliable from what i've seen. he gets the praise for a reason. many goalies are very close though. it's hard to really weigh this one because of how much tending fluctuates year to year

speed: connor mcdavid/nathan mackinnon. both are incredibly quick and actually have a lot closer numbers on average and for their top speed than a lot of people know. their play style is very different but both deserve to be known as the fastest guys out there.

pest behavior: now i'm not talking rat behavior. i'm talking about the ability to propel your team to glory by absolutely irking the opponent. so i'm going to go with matthew tkachuk mostly because he's a better player and pest combo than marchand is. marchand is more rat, matthew has higher playing level.

playoff performance: i'd love to put crosby here, but right now it's wire thin between nathan mackinnon and leon draisaitl. as far as pure scoring and points in the playoffs, it goes to leon. when it comes to the ability to drag a team to a win? i give that part to nate. i always talk about both of them together when mentioning this topic though, so i suppose it's a tie

passing: now THIS one goes purely to leon draisaitl. don't get me wrong there's guys that are close, but holy fuck ain't no one out there passing the way he is. he's excellent at it.

shot (speed/hardness): elias pettersson no comment it's insane argument over

shot (deadliness): david pastrnak, probably :]

defensive forward: patrice bergeron... probably aleksander barkov now, from what i've seen. i'm not very educated on this topic but he seems to trend into this category when talked about often.

defensive defenseman: i'd say devon toews, my favorite underrated king. sorry if this pisses some fans of defenseman off but he doesn't get the credit he deserves. he's very good defensively.

offensive defenseman: either erik karlsson or cale makar. they're always putting up good numbers. it's hard with the regression in ek's season but in his prime? idk. i'd probably still give this one to cale though.

offensive forward: connor mcdavid. shocker lol

skating: there's so many but this also trends in cale's direction for me. i don't think i've genuinely ever seen better edges. maybe datsyuk? either way lmk if there's better skaters out there but.. i'm picking cale again apologies apologies

best player: controversial but this one is a very tight race between mcdavid and mackinnon. again lol. it just depends what you're looking for. they're so much closer than people think but it's hard when their styles are so different. i say mcdavid still for this one, but nate deserves his spot at that "number two" because it's sooooo close. they're both incredible

bonus silly ones now :)

bitchiness: leon draisaitl

hair (not flow, just general amount of hair) : mika zibanejad

shit at media: everyone. congratulations you all get blue ribbons of participation!! you.. you tried!!

goober levels: mitch marner

inseparability: sidney crosby and evgeni malkin and kris letang

weirdness in goalie terms: marc-andre fleury but also all of them

honorable mention picks...

best veteran: we all know. it's sidney fucking crosby and don't even get me STARTED on him anyway

best captain: gabriel landeskog. truthfully but also i'm biased hence why it's here not mixed in with alllllll the others lol

hope you enjoyed my mania

*honorable mention players include mikko rantanen, quinn and jack hughes, adam fox, roman josi, more goalies than i can mention, ovechkin for goal scoring, andrei svechnikov, and so many more because guess what! this league is insane! i could talk about the talent of them all for hours! seasonally or consistently. i love raving about them all. it's very hard to just choose A guy for each category. not enough people see how close many players are to each other in skill levels in my opinion, but then again this is just for fun lol. feel free to debate me i don't mind

[princess-of-the-corner]

In that RPG submission/ask, I mentioned a digression, well here it is. I also wanted to give Chloe the class of (Macabre Dancer - Yōsen-shi), the Flowers of the Battlefield class. But it required too much context, didn't fit the classic RPG structure & became its own post.

So yeah, some ML characters The World R2 classes, though rather than being a game this could just be its own setting as the game has the lore to support it:

Chloe - Macabre Dancer The flowers of the battlefield, these skilled dancers hold deals with spirits of light and darkness. They wield bladed fans that enchant those who watch and are proficient in both offensive and healing magic.

I figure given Chloe's upbringing, and dance being something she has skills in from the show it would be a class she would gravitate towards and be accepted due to her station. Also yin and yang fits here theme.

Note: Steam Gunner, Flick Reaper, or Twin Blade could fit fairly well.

Other characters are harder to fit, but off the cuff -

Adrien - Steam Gunner Specializing in long-range attack with their Chim powered guns, this combatant can defend themselves even in the melee wit their powerful bayonet!

I figure this would fit Gabriel's focus on Adrien having a high class combat hobby like fencing while keeping him out of the line of fire.

Note: Tribal Grappler or Flick Reaper could fit due to combat style.

Kagami - Adept Rogue Unlike traditional fantasy, the Adept rogue is not a stealth combatant but a master of arms Capable of learning to wield any weapons or magic, making them highly adaptable.

I felt this fit with her doing kendo, fencing and the sword she wields as Ryuko as well as the multi elemental attack side of things.

Note: I see potential in Blade Brandier for both Adrien & Kagami, but less so if only cos, while these designs slap, there's less to do with them as characters beyond swords.

Afraid of losing this submission so will send it in now, but I could see Sabrina as a Steam Gunner or Shadow Warlock perhaps. Everyone else, hoo boy, lots to muse on there.

Also there's various types of cat folk in the world, so Adrien def has cat ears and tail.

Oh? I love these though!

[that-left-turn]

Shipping is fun and it gets the fandom involved but when the fandom tries to force others to think their way or fights with the studios or the actors that’s the real cringefest. Us carylers need to stop creating friction and enemies by being negative with others who don’t agree with what we see. Or use slightly racist rhetoric which I take offense too as my adopted son and daughter are Vietnamese. No one thought my wife and I were a romantic fit but we were until we weren’t so no one had to see it or agree but us. that’s what my last anon ask was about. we make ourselves look stupid when we pick apart stuff like the big 3 thing. That’s meaningless bs that makes us look bitter and crazy and like canon is all that matter when we all know we may not ever get canon anyway. I’m an old x files shipper who knows how ridiculously fun but bad this can get especially if we let the bitter people who fight about everything that doesn’t match their vision for our ship make everyone hate us We can’t have nice things if we make everyone hate us including the actors and studios

I'm not the best person to speak on fandom politics because I don't really participate. (I post fic very occasionally and I have this blog.) It feels like a waste of time I don’t have—I’d rather be writing said fic than argue with strangers about something as subjective as what TV characters to like. I have posted about racism before and my short-version take on bigotry is: it's not okay, regardless of who happens to share their casual -isms with the crowd.

I have a huge issue with the recent interviews Norman did in Japan. It's problematic to say that, because “we” (what ‘we’ is that, Norman?) wanted to write a ‘real’ French show, the WOC showrunner got fired in favor of a white American man. I’m confused: what uniquely qualifies Zabel over Kang? 👀

In one of the after-episode snippets, Clémence said the show has “all the French cliches.” (I wish I could post a link, but I don't have time to search. If someone knows where to find it online, please let me know?) S1 has all the American jingoistic tropes and the French characters act culturally American. With streaming services offering a variety of European TV shows, anyone can do a comparison to see if DD feels more French/European (like Norman claims) or like prettied-up American network TV.

I'm aware of the “big 3” debacle and disliked the incendiary nature of Valhalla’s post. I also disliked that some fans went out of their way to replace Michonne because of course there can only be one girl who's important 🙄 There appears to be a lot of internalized misogyny in the fandom. Both women are vital to the franchise, and Gabriel's character development was amazing and brilliantly acted too, so why doesn't he make the big three? Rankings are useless because they're arbitrary and encourage division between fans. A fractured audience is not a good thing.

Studios don't hate anyone. It’s a business and the programming execs spend zero seconds pondering what fans say. That's a different department, but I’m not sure AMC employs qualified marketing strategists. The official SM accounts look like they’re run by interns with “on the job” training. Part of the (legacy) issue is that under a previous showrunner for the flagship show, this dog-eats-dog behavior was encouraged simply because it mirrored the bleak setting of TWD. It's not an ethical approach, nor is it a good ROI to scare away the people who’d pay for merchandise and provide good word-of-mouth for the show(s).

The DD EPs want to make a show they think looks cool/epic—it's all about the visual esthetic and some of them are so burnt out they don't even care about the plot at all. A fanfic author writes to please themselves, but a screenwriter has to please their audience. The viewership are paying customers, so they have the right to an opinion on what they're willing to buy. I'm deeply uncomfortable with the idea that women should be quiet and behave like good little girls, so the men in charge might reward us with “nice things.” I’ve seen that show before and there’s no treat awaiting the docile at the end.

Based on the latest slew of interviews, the buzzword du jour seems to have moved on from ‘cool’ and ‘epic’ (probably because they gained ridicule instead of traction) to ‘romantic.’ It's a hard sales pitch to the very audience Norman normally complains about. The ‘crazy and bitter’ women of the fandom are the proverbial hand that feeds him and he needs their approval, not the other way around.

I'm aware, though, that some fandom behavior has spiraled into a never-ending ship war. That's the environment AMC/TWDU has created by not encouraging an atmosphere where they lift up all their characters and by not writing female friendships into the show. Everyone's worst side is on display and nobody “wins.”

[ohgodimafraud]

the thing that would not leave (t/diapt)

fandom: t/he d/evil is a part timer

characters: u/rushihara and g/abriel (could be a ship if u want)

summary: How i think g/abriel entering the devils castle and harassing l/ucifer shouldve gone (l/ucifer has a cold obvi)

word count: 1,487

Minors DNI

***

It’s rare for Urushihara to have the apartment to himself these days, and that makes it all the more offensive to have an intruder who hadn’t been relevant in ages up until recently. The fan continued to whir in the background and for once the breeze was actually giving him enough reprieve from the sweltering that he had goosebumps. With the constant humidity, this was something welcome, unlike Gabriel’s presence. He’d give his back teeth to see Alas Ramus beating his ass any day; he’d only heard the recounts from Maou and Emilia, but he was sure such a sight would keep him entertained for the next few decades. 

Even after writing down the original demon king’s “treasures” he hadn’t moved to leave and it was beginning to cut into his online shopping time. 

“It looks like a drunk seven year old wrote this,” Gabriel sighed, looking at the paper. “Really?”

“I can type ninety words a minute, y’know dude.”

“Mm’kay…how can you be alive for this long and still have handwriting like that? Is that not a part of NEET pride?”

“No.” Urushihara rolled his eyes and shook his head. For a moment there was silence save for the clacking of his keyboard and the whirring of his fan. All this back and forth was starting to drain him.

“So…think of any other treasures?” 

“Dude, that’s all I got. Like I said, most Satans are poor.” He gestured to the room around them before pointedly turning back to the screen. Eventually the big lug would show himself out. He rubbed his nose. A tickle had taken root and had been prickling at the pack of his nose since earlier in the morning and much like Gabriel, it had stubbornly refused to leave. He’d lost track of how much he’d sneezed today already. 

Eventually, he couldn’t take it anymore.

“Hehh…” He took in a vocal inhale and with one hand, turned the brightness of the screen up for encouragement, and with the other hand brought his collar up over his nose before sneezing violently into the fabric of his shirt. “hAH’KSSHhieeh!” 

Gabriel flinched at the loud expulsion, but his initial expression of confusion quickly shifted to amusement. “Bless you? Oh wait. Can I say that given your…condition?”

Urushihara glared at him. “Dude, you’re actually not, like, supposed to say anything here.” He pulled a tissue out from the dwindling supply in the travel pack next to his leg.

“Hm. But I have a question.”

Urushihara blew his nose. Noisily. 

Gabriel took this as his cue to continue. Apparently he was already correcting his earlier digression of reading the mood. “Since when do you sneeze like that?”He was on his way to becoming a second-rate-NEET after all. 

Urushihara turned red. “Like what? Leave me ahhlone,” he protested, breath hitching slightly with the threat of another performance. Fuck. He scrubbed at his nose, but from the persistent way his eyes kept trying to close, he knew trying to ward off the sneeze was a lost cause. 

Gabriel put his stupid hands on his stupid hips and bent forward like a stupid rooster waiting for a worm to come out of the ground. “I’ll wait. You take your time, bud.”

“hadhtKSHH’iieeh!” Urushihara crumpled forward and shook from the kickback of the sneeze. He emitted a raspy groan and sniffled and rubbed his nose with his wrist.

“I’m really just supposed to not comment on that?” 

“Dude,” Urushihara grumbled and sniffled. “What do you want from me?” Gabriel scratched his head and sighed. “Well, I came all this way and you gave me nothung, so—”

“Nothung is a sword. What do you want from me?”

“Oh.” Gabriel relaxed slightly as Lucifer gave him a look of contempt. He helped himself to a glass of cold barley tea. “All I’m sayin’ is you were pretty notorious for having a cute little kitten sneeze.”

Urushihara suppressed a shudder as he fished out another tissue and shook his head. “Don’t say kitten.” 

“Just wondering why you’re suddenly screaming. Trying to compensate for—“

Urushihara groaned and cut him off. “Dude, what the hell? Where do you get off coming here to insult me?” He sniffled again and gave his nose an upward swipe with the tissue and then he continued reading the Poketure TV tropes page. “Keep your crush to yourself. I’m not interested.”

“Aw, don’t be like that.” Gabriel rubbed the back of his neck and let out a huff of amusement. “Besides, I’m pretty sure I’m outta your league nowadays, so—“

“You’re a damn baby snatcher!” 

Gabriel winced and sat next to him. “Well, I did have some juicy info for you, bud, but after that, I think I’m gonna need some compensation.”

“Dude, Ashiya’ll literally rip you a new one if you take one more thing from the fridge.”

Gabriel smiled. “C’mon, not like that. Guess you can say I’ve been bored too, m’kay?”

“Try getting a life,” Urushihara muttered under his breath as he attempted to return to his own in discovering some fan analyses of the most recent movie in the franchise. He sniffled again and coughed briefly. 

“You getting a cold there, bud?”

“I don’t know, okay?” 

Gabriel leaned in and poked the tip of his nose. “Bang.” 

“What—hih-hht-! ugh f-fuck you.” He’d been a fraction of a second late in batting his hand away and the damage had already been done. “hehhdt…KKSHHh! HehKSSHHH’iEEH!”

“Hm…you probably are.”

“What the hell?” Urushihara crossed his arms and moved out of his reach. He pinched away a few tears from the inner corners of his eyes before flashing a glare. “What are you talking about?”

“You probably have a cold.” Gabriel made himself comfortable on the tatami mat beside him. “Did you start sneezing like that to seem tough around the demons?” 

“Dude, no!” Urushihara’s frown turned into a look of disgust. “You’re so weird. Stop asking me questions about my sneezes.”

“I’m already not reading the mood.”

“Congrats.” 

“You know, you should be a little nicer to me.” Gabriel sighed.

Urushihara rolled his eyes and grabbed another tissue. The day he started sucking up to Gabriel would be when hell had been frozen over for a millennia. His nose stung with each chafe of the cheap one-ply fabric, and he was starting to think he did in fact have a cold.

“You don’t really sound good. Was falling really worth it?” 

“Yes.” Urushihara lowered the tissue for a moment and then squinted slightly before pinching off the budding itch. He was getting more nasally with each word. “And if you think so, that's another good reason to leave.”

“I’m sure you could use the company.”

Urushihara ignored him and scrolled further down the page and smirked at the text. The Thing That Would Not Leave, he read. How cliché. If he could just sit there in silence, eventually Gabriel would leave. Unfortunately, with the way the past few hours had been going, it might not be so easy, and the glare from the blue-tinted light was actively working against his attempts at ignoring the itch that was worsening with every inhale. 

“Need another tissue?” Gabriel asked in amusement as he looked over him. He leaned in closer and smiled. “Looks like you’re gonna start up again.”

“Juhhstt stop talki’hhg abouhht—heh…KSHh! Ihkshh! h’KTshh! Iht’kshh!” He sneezed in rapid fire succession, wrist moving up halfway through the fit to cover his nose. They kept coming on, fittish and pitchy, and he was unable to do anything other than ride it out. “mpt’TSShh! http’SHhhee! ihh..hh’TSchhieh!”

“Yeah, that’s more like I remember.”

“Hehht’ZSHHh! Okay? Happy?” He buried his nose into a fresh tissue and blew it again. It was filled and rendered useless after emptying one nostril and he needed to grab a few more. 

Gabriel also took a tissue and wiped the spray from his obnoxious t-shirt. In retrospect, he shouldn’t have gotten so close, but his curiosity had been appeased so he’d accept the consequences. “Guess I’m satisfied for now. Anyway, as I was gonna say…you really should be nicer to me, mm’kay? I’m the only reason The Watcher is standing down.”

“The—“ Urushihara sniffled and took a deep breath. “Why didn’t you lead with that? What the hell?”

“You should’ve guessed, because Sariel—“

“Hdt’ShhHieh! No! How would I know I’ve been out of the loop for like ever!”

“Aw. Bless y—“

“Dude I’m about to make a few calls and have you escorted out.”

“I’ll be long gone by the time you do.” Gabriel smiled. “Anyway, if you wanna do this again sometime, here’s my number.” He tore a paper and scrawled his number on it and flicked it at him. “Call me if you want to do this again sometime.”

“In your dreams.”

“Hope you have a nice day, bud.” Gabriel’s smile only widened before he finally left. 

Urushihara switched tabs and added same-day-shipping lotion-infused tissues to the cart.

[rants-of-rae]

An Admittedly Harsh Review of Good Omens Season 2

~ obviously contains spoilers for Good Omens s2 ~

Let me start off by saying that I absolutely ADORE Good Omens, both the book as well as season 1. I love the story, the characters, the writing, the acting, all of it. I'm a huge fan of Crowley and Aziraphale. So trust me when I say that it breaks my heart to leave anything but a glowing review of the second season.

That said, I feel like the second season has received a lot of praise. Fans seem to be generally happy about the way the show went, though obviously 'upset' about the events at the end of the season, as was intended. There were definitely fun things about the show that deserve some praise. However, I don't feel like the show has received the criticism that it is also due. And because of how much I love the first season and the ineffables, I feel like I owe it to myself to give voice to these criticisms. They are as follows:

1 Lack of Emotional Depth

Compared to a first season brimming with emotional depth, meaning, and complexity, the second season of Good Omens is incredibly lacking in multiple ways. Not only is the plot almost virtually void of meaningful emotion, the characters are regrettably emotionally dry. With a big caveat for the final emotional confrontation between Crowley and Aziraphale in the last episode (to be discussed again later), the rest of the show feels quite shallow. Aziraphale and Crowley have little meaningful conversation throughout the entirety of the series; they've just come out of the world almost ending and major upheaval in their realities and in their relationship with one another at the end of season 1, yet the two seem oddly distant from each other, and not even purposefully. Crowley is largely emotionally checked out most of the season, and Aziraphale is just stressed about Gabriel, but gives no thoughts whatsoever to Crowley, which just reads as characterization and dialogue poorly done.

What makes the lack of emotional depth in, and connection between, Aziraphale and Crowley even worse is that the other characters in the season are also horribly lacking emotion. I'll give a pass to Gabriel given it's part of his characterization, but the introduction of Nina and Maggie was disappointing. I was all for the intro of new characters with side romance plots, but the plot between these two feels contrived and, most of all, rushed. Their development is rushed to the extent that it's impossible for these characters to develop emotional depth that would resonate with the audience. Whereas we had extensive scenes of Newton, Anathema, Adam, etc in season one, we barely had scenes dedicated to exploring these two a bit more in depth. I found myself unable to really care about them at all which is a true shame because, as a sapphic myself, I was pretty excited about them.

What makes the ending confrontation between Aziraphale and Crowley so much worse is the fact that they had so little emotional interactions prior to this throughout the season. They were very surface-level, status quo, emotionally neutral through the season except for the tiniest whispers of something romantic before BAM this final dramatic confrontation. That scene was, unfortunately, the only time the entire season I felt like I was actually watching the Crowley and Aziraphale I know and love from season one. Talk about traumatic.

2 Inconsistent Characterization

This is largely intertwined with lack of emotional depth, but it deserves its own focus, too. Some of the character decisions simply do not make sense. Case in point: Crowley living in his car and Aziraphale not knowing and/or not offering him a place to stay. That is so unlike Aziraphale that it hurts. Crowley does something equally offensive by throwing Aziraphale's books around when Aziraphale isn't around. Given that he went to great lengths to save Aziraphale's books in season one and respects his angel with soft adoration, I find it jarring that Crowley would do this. Aziraphale doesn't seem as reflective as he did in season 1. Crowley, who we could always read behind the glasses, seems cold and closed off this season. I felt like I was watching a sad alternate universe version of them.

3 Painfully Slow Plot & Filler Content

To be fair, characters can't shine when the story they're in is sorely lacking.... everything. Each episode I watched became more and more nonsensical, boring, and painful. Flashback scenes were drawn out, the entire fourth episode was drawn out and flat, and the Hell vs Bookshop 'fight' scene towards the end was equally drawn out and anticlimactic. Towards the end of the season, it felt as if I were very slowly having a tooth pulled, and it just ended in the worst way possible. Compared to the brilliance of season 1, season 2's plot and content was disorganized, drawn out, rambling, and frankly felt like filler. The entire Nazi-zombie arc was... painful. The magic scene went on for a lifetime. I truly don't understand how the show managed to do so little with so much time.

Some Concluding Thoughts

The fact that all this culminated in a very intense and dramatic scene between Aziraphale and Crowley makes that interaction even more painful. While there are perhaps some reasons I could see Aziraphale making this decision despite the lessons he supposedly learned in season 1, this again just reads as poorly done to me. Crowley went from showing almost no emotion the entire season to having this very dramatic moment... I would have liked to see consistent hints of this. Without build-up this felt disproportionately unexpected and shocking. The scene undoubtedly has potential and is a very interesting consideration for the characters, but I struggle to care about this scene when it feels so utterly lacking in context.

Overall, as a huge fan on Good Omens and Aziraphale and Crowley, I'm quite disappointed with season 2. I had a lot of hope and excitement for it, but this... this brought disappointment and hurt. The writing felt rushed while also somehow grasping for content. Previously rich and developed characters felt flat. No emotional context existed to draw me in. Each episode, I slipped into a lower level of disappointment.

I'm not a fan of praising things for doing the bare minimum, and that's what this felt like. Just because side-plots geared towards some of the interests that the audience has expressed are included, it doesn't matter if those side-plots and characters end up lacking the context and depth they deserve. If there wasn't enough content to create a second season, better to not make it, in my opinion. Just because we got ~ the kiss ~ the rest of the show doesn't matter. To me, it feels as if they thought that was enough and that everything else would be overlooked as long as this one thing happened.

But... I'm not just going to overlook it. Compared to the fun, emotionally rich, exciting first season of Good Omens, season 2 is barely an echo of that original energy. This season deserves to be critiqued, so I'm going to say it.

I'm wary but cautiously hopeful about a third season. I'm hoping that that story and season would be more reminiscent of the first season's emotionality and meaning, and that we would see depth to our characters again. I could almost forgive season 2 if we got a genuinely well-done conclusion to the story.

// End Rant

[chaos0pikachu]

tldr: censorship fucking sucks and word of honor and xena are mlm/wlw solidarity 

okay this was a random thought that came to me during a combo of rewatching of Word of Honor and reading a post that declared Word of Honor “didn’t count” on their BL list of whatever the fuck and here’s the thought, here’s the vibe, Word Of Honor has a lot in common with Xena: Warrior Princess

Hear me out

Everyone kinda knows that Xena - and by extension Lucy Lawless - as a bisexual/queer woman icon, and that Xena/Gabrielle is probably still one of the most prominent wlw ships in western canon. That’s a huge part of the shows iconography in pop culture. But like, if you rewatch the show, things between Xena and Gabrielle are kept pretty ambiguous but in that ambiguously totally gay way (like WenZhou!). 

The network was actively against Xena and Gabrielle being more than, what fans would probably call nowadays, bait. An executive told producer Rob Tapert that by making Xena and Gabrielle explicit there would be a surge of interested followed by a sharp decline. 

It should be noted that Xena was already a controversial show for it’s era - not just for the gay subtext but under fire from religious groups, anti-feminist groups, and others. 

The showrunners and producers also didn’t intend for Xena and Gabrielle’s relationship to, eh, blossom the way it did. Fans ran with it. Ironically, the intention of the show was to push Xena’s men of color love interests which also made the network gun shy (remember folks racism exists alongside homophobia!). 

Xena and Gabrielle operated in a highly censored space (that still exists in American media btw!! Take it from someone who knows first hand) that was beholden to network hand-wringing, capitalism, and societal homophobia at large.  So their relationship could only live within an ambiguous space. Ironically enough, just like WenZhou, Xena and Gabrielle are also referred to as “soulmates” in the text of the show. But ya know, sometimes soulmates are platonic, sometimes romantic. Which are WenZhou and Xena/Gabrielle? Well that’s up for the viewer to decide b/c the production teams hands are tied. 

Even so, even with the censorship, we all still view Xena as legitimate queer representation within the pop culture space. Why? Why Xena and not Word of Honor?

For me, they both count, especially WoH because it’s source material IS queer. But the filter of censorship snipped and cut the text away so everything would be forced to live within that ambiguous “up to the audience aka gotta make the advertisers comfortable” space. 

I don’t think it’s fair to throw WoH out because the production couldn’t, like they were not allowed, to showcase text on screen. Similar to Xena queer fans knew that her and Gabrielle were in love, soulmates (romantic) by the end (where Xena dies, like literal for reals death she’s ashes carried on by Gabby at the end btw spoiler alert for a 20 year old show at least WK got silver hair and immortality out of his death experience). 

Queer fans appreciated and cultivated what Xena gave us because, no offense but what the fuck else was there? Not a lot, and even less in the fantasy space. Hell, there’s still not a lot of queer representation in the fantasy space we’re only just now going “hey maybe Tolkien’s ultra white British view of things is not the only way to do things?" And now House of Dragon has Black actors in terrible wigs (they’re so fucking bad rip) in 2022. Woooo~ most queer chars in western fantasy media are mainly found in kids cartoons - which, fucking aces there but also - probably why there’s so many adults in those spaces in fandom (not my bag personally) and why I think the popularity of danmei, c-dramas, and k-dramas is on the rise. People are hungry for epic fantasy content, epic romance content, and queer content. 

but like, I think about queer folks who live in China, who watched WoH (ya know, the intended audience, not Americans) who are probably feeling the same thing people felt when they watched Xena. Yeah, Mr. Advertiser Xena and Gabrielle are soulmates (platonic) wink wink, Yeah Mr. Network ZZS and WKX are soulmates (platonic) wink wink

and I think that’s still valuable. idk I just don’t think it’s right for foreigners to be like “no you’re queer media doesn’t count actually because I deem it so” when the reason for the relationship being subtextual is literal censorship. And yet the text is hella gay anyway!! like at the end of the day we’re all battling the crushing weight of homophobia but not everyone’s fight is exactly the same especially country-to-country and I think that should still be respected. given how damn gay WoH is anyway I imagine the producers fought really fucking hard to give audiences what they did. Just like the producers of Xena fought against the network to do what they could. 

anyway, thoughts and shit

[justsomeguycore]

Long Post Contains They/Them Spoilers

two really interesting points on the same aspect of the film that disagree but both have truth to them imo. realistically, jordan didn’t have to shoot owen because he was already dying, but aside from that, exactly what this person points out: the push and pull of owen and cora’s two pronged offense of manipulating jordan into give up on being a trans man and also give up on being a gnc and/or lesbian woman, when really they are neither of those things, but i have to assume the idea was to make both so unbearable for them that they would just choose to be a feminine cis woman.

to be honest i was somewhat confused by owen’s approach with jordan - maybe he was too, because it’s implied he’s never encountered a nonbinary kid before. i also considered that perhaps jordan’s assigned gender at birth was intended to be ambiguous and maybe owen assumed they were amab and cora assumed they were afab but neither actually knew? but there wasn’t really anything to support that, i was just trying to understand why owen insisted on alexandra staying in the boys’ cabin but also placed jordan there when it’s implied by the photograph that jordan was assigned female at birth.

but now i’m thinking that this is actually a pretty good example of how transphobia and transmisogyny are experienced distinctly - alexandra is not allowed to even attempt being a girl, the second they find out that she’s trans they send her to the boys’ cabin. the idea that a trans woman is not a woman at all but a sort of failed man who could be made masculine again, vs the idea that a transmasculine person is also their own kind of failed man who needs to give up and just be a girl again. this is the patriarchy in action, the idea that the ideal person is a cis man and that everyone else is measured against that ideal. where owen pretends to let jordan attempt being a boy, knowing that he will force them to feel like they’ve failed. to effectively break them both, alexandra needed to have femininity withheld from her, where jordan needed to have toxic masculinity piled onto them before ideally reintroducing femininity as a salve to that inevitable defeat.

ANYWAY back to my original point. owen was already dying by the time jordan had the chance to kill him. there was no need for jordan to take the shot other than to prove they could, essentially, to prove that they had the capacity for the ultimate show of masculinity that owen was always challenging them to. molly wanted jordan to be able to feel catharsis about ending their abuser’s life, but jordan knew they would not get catharsis from it, and that’s why they ultimately refused. not because they’re better than getting revenge, just because they didn’t want it.

and to be frank, i don’t think labeling owen as jordan’s abuser is even an accurate reading of the film. like of course owen was abusive towards jordan, but imagine whatever jordan went through at the hands of their family was much harder on them than what they experienced at camp. it would have been a symbolic victory more than anything else, whereas for molly it was very very personal.

all that said, i think the first poster here makes a great point about the target audience of this movie definitely not being horror fans. it was more a queer coming of age story with horror as the sort of setting. like clearly the real monster is conversion therapy etc, and it’s true, the scenes showing conversion methods were much more terrifying than anything the slasher was doing. but i think that fell flat when the climactic scene involved the slasher plot more than the conversion plot. i actually think the images of gabriel being put through rapid aversion therapy and being shocked to death was like, wayyyy more intense than the actual climax.

so was it good or bad to kill or not kill your abuser or not really your abuser? yea. it’s complicated. i think the ultimate messaging was that conversion therapy is bad but murder also not good, which is like, an understandable message but not a very interesting one, nor anything very horrifying.

i think this movie’s plot is sort of set up to fail, because when you watch a slasher film there’s supposed to be sort of mixed feelings about the characters who get killed. like yeah you want to watch the slashings, but the stakes aren’t very high when the only people getting killed are obviously terrible people. you’re kind of just like. go slasher!

anyway this is a lot of thoughts and not a real review but. there it is

[twins2994]

O's Thump Twins 8-3.

Orioles 8 Twins 3 W-Irvin (1-1) L-Stewart (1-1)

The Minnesota Twins are wrapping up the final days of Spring Training before the regular season starts on Thursday. They hosted the Orioles today in Fort Myers. The Orioles were ready from the start as Gunnar Henderson crushed a Joe Ryan fastball out to right for a solo homer in the first inning. Baltimore added on in the second with a Ryan O'Hearn lead-off single. He reached second on a balk and James McCann reached on a fielder's choice. Ramon Urias hit a sac fly to center to double the O's lead. The Twins would answer in the fourth when they loaded up the bases. Matt Wallner hit an RBI groundout and the Twins pulled within a run after four frames. The Twins got back to work in the fifth with a Gabriel Gonzalez lead-off double to left. Jay Harry lined a single to right and Alex Kirilloff hit into a double play, which scored the game-tying run. We remained tied at two after five innings of play. The Orioles bounced back in the sixth as Ryan Mountcastle reached on a two-out single. A wild pitch moved the runner up to second and Ryan O'Hearn doubled home a run to put Baltimore on top. The O's added on in the seventh when Ramon Urias and Jordan Wesburg singled. Adley Rutschman smoked a Jorge Alcala slider out to right-center for a three-run homer to put Baltimore up by four. The Orioles slowly loaded the bases in the eighth and Jordan Westburg knocked in a pair with a single to left. The Twins would rally in the ninth when Maddux Houghton and Misael Urbina singled. Keoni Cavaco singled home a run and the Twins pulled within five. Rubel Cespedes hit a nubber to the catcher to end the game and the Orioles picked up the win today.

-Final Thoughts- Joe Ryan had a decent day in his final tuneup before the season starts. He went five innings and allowed two runs on two hits with five strikeouts. Brock Stewart gave up a run and struck out two in the sixth, Jorge Alcala gave up five runs in 1 1/3 innings, and Steven Okert fanned two in an inning of work. Scott Blewett got the final two outs of the night. Royce Lewis and Ryan Jeffers had two hits to lead the offense. The Twins hit 3-for-10 with runners in scoring position and left ten men on base. The Twins head out on the road for the final time of the spring. They will face the Braves as Bailey Ober faces Chris Sale in North Port.

-Chris Kreibich-

[crimechannels]

By • Olalekan Fagbade Arsenal vs. Fulham Preview: Team News, Probable Lineups, Prediction   Arsenal will welcome Fulham to the Emirates Stadium at 3 p.m. on Saturday, August 26 as they continue their push for a better 2023-2024 Premier League season. So far this season, the Gunners are one of just three teams to start the campaign with two victories in two games which has helped them remain third in the early standings, behind the reigning champions Manchester City and early leaders Brighton & Hove Albion. With their 1-0 victory against Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park on Monday, August 21, the Gunners kept 200 consecutive Premier League road clean sheets; only Chelsea (204) and Manchester United (205) have more. However, it is an open secret that Arsenal’s defense has issues at home. Coach Mikel Arteta’s team had only one clean sheet in their past eight Premier League games played in front of their home fans. But the good news is that Fulham’s recent goal-scoring efforts have not been indicative of a team that can compete with the Gunners. Talking about Fulham, Aleksandar Mitrovic’s high-profile transfer to Al-Hilal marked the end of a protracted transfer process that almost destabilized the squad. Fulham boss Marco Silva is already making preparations for life after the departed club’s talisman but the side don’t seem ready for an away game against a resilient Arsenal side. Recall that Silva’s boys were humiliated 3-0 by Brentford last weekend after a smash-and-grab victory at Everton’s stadium that could have easily gone the Toffees’ way on a good day. Hence, it would be a shocker of the weekend if Fulham get more than a point at the Emirates Stadium this weekend. Arsenal vs. Fulham: Team News Arsenal fullback, Tomiyasu will miss this London derby due to a suspension as he was sent off after two bookable offenses against Palace last weekend. Jurrien Timber is still sidelined as he battles to recover from an ACL injury. Albert Sambi Lokonga’s muscular issue has not changed, although the Belgian is most likely to join the team before the month is over. Strikers Gabriel Jesus and Folarin Balogun are also sidelined with knee and foot issues. With his improved fitness level, Oleksandr Zinchenko, who came off the bench against Palace, could take Tomiyasu’s place on the left side of the field this weekend. As for Fulham, Nigerian defender Calvin Bassey might pair with Issa Diop in defense against Arsenal as the ostracized Tosin Adarabioyo looks for a transfer away from the club. Fulham will also be without Ream who was given his marching orders after receiving two yellow cards in their loss to Brentford. The good news for Fulham is that the club’s midfielder Joao Palhinha is back from a shoulder injury which means the club does not have any other injury worries. Arsenal probable lineup: Ramsdale; White, Saliba, Gabriel, Zinchenko; Odegaard, Rice, Havertz; Saka, Nketiah, Martinelli Fulham probable lineup: Leno; Tete, Diop, Bassey, Robinson; Reed, Palhinha; Traore, Pereira, Decordova-Reid; Jimenez. Arsenal have an 80 percent chance of beating Fulham at the Emirates Stadium and it would be a shocker if it happens otherwise. The game should end 3-1 in favour of the Gunners #Arsenal #EPL #Fulham #lineups #predictions #preview

[freelance-informatique]

PSG vs Toulouse FC : ce que prépare le club toulousain face à la machine parisienne

Les passionnés de football sont déjà sur le qui-vive : le Toulouse FC est en phase finale de sa préparation pour affronter le colosse parisien, le PSG, ce 19 août 2023. À l'aube de cette deuxième journée de Ligue 1, les enjeux et les attentes sont énormes. PSG vs Toulouse FC : MNM cédera-t-elle sa place à la MDR ? PSG vs Toulouse FC... Le Paris Saint-Germain a fait les beaux jours avec la MNM (Mbappe, Neymar, Messi). s'apprête-t-elle à dévoiler une nouvelle combinaison offensive : MDR. Des murmures suggèrent une possible apparition de ce trio, composé de MBappé, Dembélé et Ramos. https://twitter.com/PSGINT_/status/1692518885021405216 Le jeune Gonçalo Ramos, agissant en tant que pivot, pourrait être entouré par le duo explosif MBappé-Dembélé. L'incertitude plane toujours quant à la titularisation de MBappé et Dembélé. Lire aussi : Christophe Galtier : enfin un banc en Ligue 1 ? Toulouse FC, prêt à affronter la machine parisienne du PSG Gabriel Suazo, le solide défenseur du TFC, a confirmé lors d'une conférence de presse récente que toute l'équipe est en alerte. "Nous avons minutieusement étudié les forces et faiblesses du PSG. La possible présence ou non de MBappé dans la formation parisienne ne change en rien notre préparation", confie-t-il. Au-delà de la stratégie, l'émotion est palpable du côté toulousain. Le TFC, après sa victoire récente face à Nantes et malgré le départ de plusieurs de ses joueurs clés, est plus que jamais déterminé à transmettre de la joie et de la passion à ses fans. La motivation et la concentration sont au rendez-vous. Carles Martinez Novell, le stratège du TFC face au PSG L'entraîneur toulousain, Carles Martinez Novell, insiste fortement sur l'importance de montrer de l'intensité face à une équipe comme le PSG, qui se présente cette saison avec une ambition renforcée. "Affronter le PSG est un challenge très excitant. https://twitter.com/_BeFootball/status/1669006043039379460 Le niveau de concentration de mes joueurs doit surpasser celui du début de saison", déclare Novell. Il rappelle aussi que la préparation du TFC ne se base pas seulement sur les dernières performances, citant le récent match amical contre la Roma au Stadium comme exemple. Voir également : Détails, durée d’indisponibilité révélés d'Alban Lafont après sa blessure ! Entre espoirs et défis : l'ambiance au Toulouse FC face au PSG Tout le staff et les joueurs toulousains sont bouillants d'enthousiasme. L'objectif est clair : offrir une performance solide pour faire vibrer les supporters. "Nous voulons leur transmettre de la joie", confirme Novell. Pour les plus curieux : cap sur Actu Si vous souhaitez avoir un aperçu de la préparation du TFC et de ses précédents exploits, des vidéos sont disponibles sur la plateforme Actu. Une occasion à ne pas rater pour se mettre dans le bain avant le grand match ! ________ Retrouvez toute l'actu foot sur notre page Facebook et sur notre page Twitter ! Read the full article

[popmusicu]

Paul is Dead

Paul is Dead

              The conspiracy theory of Paul Mccartney being dead and having been replaced during the second half of the Beatles career by a double is probably the most famous celebrity death conspiracy that exists. Based on arguments that compare pictures from before and after and defend that there’s hidden messages in The Beatles music and album covers, this idea has influenced many posterior celebrities death conspiracies and is always a fun conversation to have or simply a joke to throw around.

              What seems interesting to me, is not the factual debate of whether there is enough evidence to consider the possibility of Paul Mccartney having been replaced (which can actually be debunked pretty easily with a bit of logic), but rather the cultural phenomenon that this conspiracy theory reveals.              Behind the “Paul is dead” theory there are cultural forces and bigger structures of society functioning that allow such an idea to get spread so massively and with such success. By getting deeper into identifying them, we can reach also a higher understanding of the cultural and aesthetic characteristics of pop culture and pop music.

              If people think Paul Mccartney is dead, it is because, in first place, people value the life of Paul Mccartney as something that can be taken away from them. There´s an assumption of Paul Mccartney as a figure that is present in everyones life to the level of intimacy which makes them feel deceived when Paul may happen to not be around for us anymore. If the importance of Paul Mccartney was merely a matter of a pretty face that sings pretty songs then another guy as pretty as he was and that could sing those same pretty songs the same way could just subtitute him and it wouldn’t matter. Instead what happens is that there’s an offense to his fans when there’s even an slight possibility of having lost the real Paul. As if the real Paul carried a certain essence that could never be replicated by any other double, as technicallly similar to him as it could be.

The conspiracy theory of Paul is Dead then, might prove that the pop icon or the pop singer must be understood as a figure that’s not superficial, easily replaceable and maleable at will, but rather an important, almost inmovable figure that gains its steadiness and strength from its penetration in the masse’s individual pshyches and day to day life. We must not understimate the power of pop singers, as behind them are an army of fans that defend them as a consequence of a profound emotional connection.

Gabriel Godoi

[fotballordre]

Krig erklært, samme 4-1

Etter landskampspausen kom alle spillerne tilbake til klubben og tok på seg Billige Fotballtrøye til sine respektive lag for å gjenopplive kampen i de store ligaene. Premier League-mesterskapet er uten tvil det mest etterlengtede. I tilfellet Manchester City og gamle rival Liverpool 0-1 snudde de til slutt sterkt 4-1. Så spilte Arsenal, som kom på scenen, også en scoring på 4-1. Manchester Citys Haaland var fraværende på grunn av skade, og den argentinske tenåringen Alvarez tok på seg Manchester City Fotballtrøye for å starte kampen. Da Salah scoret Liverpools ledende mål, utnyttet Alvarez hull i Liverpools forsvar for å utligne. Og Manchester City, som alltid har hatt et overtak på banen, gikk til et voldsomt angrep i begynnelsen av andre omgang. Offensive spillere som De Bruyne og Gundogan var i god stand, og Grealish spilte også som en superstjerne. Alvarez sin enestående prestasjon Det er utrolig, hele laget scoret 4-1 med en perfekt prestasjon. Etter to og en halv time uttrykte Arsenal også sin vilje til å konkurrere om mesterskapet. Mot Leeds United hjemme, arrangerte Arsenal en fantastisk prestasjon, som drev utallige fans iført Fotballdrakter Arsenal med navn på Emirates Stadium til vanvidd. Med Gabriel Jesus som scoret to ganger og mål fra Ben White og Xhaka, vant Arsenal også 4-1. I tilfelle av en kamp til, fortsatte de å lede stillingen med 8 poeng. På sprintstadiet av ligamesterskapet har Manchester City fortsatt Champions League- og FA-cupplanene. Tredjelinjekampen er ikke en liten test for Manchester City. Og kan Arsenal, som har vunnet 7 seire på rad i ligaen, fortsette å opprettholde sin tilstand i neste kamp, slik at Arsenal kan komme tilbake til toppen etter 19 år?

[7daycycle]

Arsenal Lost to Citeh

So Arsenal lost to Man City. To be honest, I didn't realize City would finish above us if we lost the game. They were only three points behind us and now they're ahead on goal difference and it's a bit shit. A lot of Arsenal fans had become bullish on us winning the league and that confidence will be tested now.

From a meta perspective, Arsenal still have a game in hand, are in a relatively poor run and are kind halfway through the season. City have caught up and so now Arsenal's quality and resolve will finally be tested. There's a position that this is the best chance Arsenal will ever have to win the league. I've only heard about this from people who didn't think this team had the minerals to even make top four. Arsenal only have to play City twice and you don't win the league by beating the team who comes second. You win the league by beating everybody. Leicester lost to Arsenal twice, they won the league. Whatever qualities that Arsenal had to win the league 3 games ago, largely still exist. If Arsenal played the game they played yesterday there's a good chance we'd have had better results over the past few games. Not much solace, and the reality is we didn't pick up many points over those games and lost this one. The game itself was very exciting. I hate watching Arsenal lose, but I love seeing them play good teams. We made good opportunities to score, both from transition and against their set defense. An offense which seemed out of ideas for the past game showed some promise. Could be that city would be more front footed than a Sean Dyche Everton and that gave us some more space. Smarter people would know. Individual decisions and lack of quality cost the team goals. Maybe lacking a bit of confidence and fortitude but the ideas were good. Arsenal's defense and build out, however, was tested and definitely lacking. If the defense limited their mistakes, read not commit them, the offense could've played with more confidence. A Tomiyasu back pass, some shit Gabriel passes led straight to goals. Other made mistakes too and we were lucky not to have been punished. It's pretty frustrating to know that we lost the game ourselves. When you play a team that's better than you, you want them to beat you. That's the minimum. At least I can be happy that Guardiola didn't beat us. His players did. When it comes to the final bit, I know the quality of these Arsenal players is something that will increase. Individually, collectively, this team has more levels to get to. It's very exciting and I'm here for it.