#not a lot of nuance going on y’know?

[sundayswiththeilluminati]

Let Rasputin get mad.

I don’t mean about personal stuff. That’s whatever. He can deal with that on his own time, or not because he has the emotional coping mechanisms of a concussed brick, but that’s not my point. My point is: everything sucks.

The solar system Red worked so hard on is absolutely trashed. Half the factions are here just to fight the other half while Guardians do the rounds for loot. There’s not one but TWO enormous derelict alien warships lying around illegally-parked. The Moon’s fucking haunted! Two moons and a planet are gone! Some anime-ass megamind cosplayer keeps swanning around like they can’t even be bothered to kill us! And his stuff! It’s morning noon and night people trying to use his stuff to do something awful! You can be angry, you can fight back, without invoking the war-for-war’s-sake that Xivu represents. You can defend yourself without becoming violence incarnate. Guardians have to learn to walk that line now or we’re all royally screwed anyway. We have to learn to use it as a tool, same as Stasis, without being consumed by it.

So let him get mad. Let him get furious, at high velocity. Let him address a spread of caedometric ordnance “To Whom It May Concern.” Let us see the anger of a gentle machine. Let the solar system remember who was here first.

(technically the Vex. but you get my point.)

[bluegiragi]

Do you think unicorn hybrids would exist in your au? Most unicorns are described as having magic of some kind, usually healing magic. Would they just be better skilled healers than other hybrids? What type of monster would they be classified as? Sorry if this is a lot of questions, I'm just really fond of world building stuff!

y’know, I find these sorts of asks so interesting because it makes me actually have to sit and think about the effective implementation of a unicorn hybrid. Like, I think the easy way out is to go for the centaur option, but maybe it’s more like a satyr? With a horn and the classic flowing tresses and the hind legs of a unicorn, but with a human torso and head?

These hybrids would probably be a static-type hybrid (e.g Price, Gaz) where what you see is what you get, there isn’t a second transformation stage. In comparison, Soap, Horangi and Konig would be shifter-type hybrids, their base form is mostly human and they can shift to their monster form. And Ghost would be an flux-type hybrid (although he’s not really a hybrid but whatever, nuance) where there’s a mercurial amount of transformation. Another example of a flux-type would be a shapeshifter.

So to recap:

Static-type: 1 form, constant

Shifter-type: 2-3 forms, staggered

Flux type: 3+ forms, fluid

[kingofanemptyworld]

Rin, identity issues, and the complications of being an isolated, alienated teenager

It feels sort of weird to say but I generally don’t head canon characters as having particular sexualities. Whatever people go for in fics is usually fine with me - gay, lesbian, bi, pan, something more general like queer. As long as it makes sense for the story they’ve built and the character they’ve shaped to fit it, I’m good. Unless you’re ignoring a canon LGBTQ+ sexuality, in which case, yeah, I’ll take issue with that.

But anyway. Rin.

I’ve got my personal ship for him (BonRin my beloved), but regardless of the pairing I see him as bisexual. He’s so open with his infatuation with Shiemi, and okay, sure, fandom likes to ignore the love interest in shounen for the most part because we’ve got gay ships to peddle. But I don’t see the point in that unless it really reads like it’s a front, or a result of a character suppressing themselves for one reason or another. And with Rin, I think it’s pretty clear his affection for Shiemi is sincere. You technically have the in-universe evidence of the demon that brought out his true desires to back that up, but even without it, Rin likes her. It’s complicated because of Yukio and Shiemi’s own inexperience with romance, and yet I never once doubt he really likes her.

That being said… he’s very appreciative of the guys in his life, too. (Peddling my gay ship here) Bon in particular, considering he’s often admiring how cool he thinks Bon is, that his haircut suits him whether it’s the blonde rooster look or the undercut. If you don’t want to see it as romantic interest, that’s your prerogative, but to me Rin comes across as seeing cool and cute as different traits he finds attractive (in Bon and Shiemi respectively).

I also think his bisexuality would fit neatly into his narrative struggles to “pass” throughout the early parts of the series. Rin has grown up as the neighborhood problem child, ostracized for being violent, and eventually he decides he’s fine with just his brother and his father — and the rest of the monastery, presumably — for company. (Except that’s absolutely not true and clearly he’s starved for friendship and support.) People looked at him and saw a monster, even before his demonic heritage made an appearance; why would he bother giving them even more ammunition when it comes to reasons to hate him? So no matter when he figured out his attraction to guys, he’s not going to lean into it, because he also likes girls, right? (Ignoring for a moment that bisexuality is a lot more nuanced than that.)

Rin likes girls, Rin is human — that’s what’s going to get people to like him, or at the very least tolerate him. That he likes guys, that he’s half demon, he can shove that shit down and pretend it doesn’t exist. Lock up any stray thoughts and keep the sword sheathed around anyone who doesn’t already know.

(Excuse me for being amused by Rin wielding his humanity and supposed heterosexuality as a sword and shield.)

The problem, of course, is that he can’t keep up the facade forever. The narrative won’t let him. Rin has to embrace his demonic side, because it’s the only way to move forward and to continue to help his loved ones. And once he’s moved past the issue of his friends being upset over the deception, when they understand he’s still Rin despite what he’d hidden from them, Rin is finally allowed to be himself. He uses his flames, he lets his tail move freely in the open around the Cram School kids. Rin still doesn’t like this side of himself — it’s inextricably tied to every moment of pain and isolation he’s dealt with his entire life, including the death of Father Fujimoto (and, y’know, his mom). But he is moving forward, he’s trying to adapt.

And isn’t that some great fucking subtext for his bisexuality, too?

[thebroccolination]

So there’ve been two important subtitles in Between Us that Thai speakers (not me) have offered different and more nuanced translations for.

The first one is in episode two before their kiss by the pool. The subtitle in iQiYi and SWS’s uncut membership episode reads: “Kiss me.”

According to Thai speakers, what he actually says is more like, “Can I kiss you?” or even, “I’m going to kiss you, okay?”

The second example is in episode seven before they go into the bathroom stall. The subtitle reads, “Can I?”

According to some Thai speakers, what he says is literally along the lines of, “Please give (me),” or, “Can you give to me?” Basically he’s asking permission again, and I’m guessing by Team being the one to close the bathroom door behind them that it wasn’t phrased in a way that Team’s silence left Win unclear on whether Team consents or not.

Basically, if you’re in doubt about what’s being said or whether someone’s doing something dubious by the subtitles, check with a Thai speaker before you make a judgment call, because the subtitles are sometimes the dubious one, not the character. It’s just good to keep in mind that Thai and English have some major differences, and it’s possible that the translator isn’t a native English speaker or else they’re overworked and not thinking about the potential consensual problems that crop up in the difference between “kiss me” and “can I kiss you”, especially if they’ve got a lot on their plate to work on, y’know?

[chekovbeforeyouwrekovyourself]

So I’m like 3 episodes into fhjy and can I just talk about Kristen? I gotta talk about Kristen.

I think that Ally Beardsley is just one of the fucking greats, man. Not like in a technical proficiency kind of way, but in playing a character so true. I grew up going to Catholic school and then was a little atheist sapphicly inclined teen dipshit, and I just feel such a connection to Kristen Applebees. The sort of teenage invincibility of disconnecting from a toxic family and a religious view that’s been pushed on you since before you could string together a cogent sentence. The way she is with Cassandra and how that reflects in her relationship with Tracker, is a sublime amount of what feels like a fumbling intentionality.

Ally plays Kristen with such nuanced and multifaceted conviction. When you have that type of devotion and it’s running parallel to this sort of self interested (almost selfish) need to figure yourself out and to not be wrong, to not FEEL wrong.

It’s saying sorry (to your god and your girlfriend) when you don’t have any real remorse because you’re not feeling anything. You’re disowned by your parents, you are deeply traumatized by the universe, you just want to understand something for fucking once, without it becoming another wrong choice, another mistake. That conviction that runs as deep as your fear, it’s so wild to feel, so you’re just trying to get through it.

I just see a lot of my teenage self in Kristen. Now I’m a 26 year old non binary dipshit who feels a deep spirituality with no real central focus or authored tenets, I’m estranged from my family in multiple senses, and somewhere, deep inside there’s still that scared teen who just wants to feel like I’m doing the right thing, the good thing for me. I think it’s hard to align the good thing and the things in your best interests sometimes. Especially when you’re so divorced from yourself as a person, y’know?

Anyway, I just think the world of Ally Beardsley and how they play Kristen, and I’m sure as I watch more of Junior Year I’ll have more to say about it all.

[pawberri]

Do you have any recommendations for non-furry visual novels? I'm a bit overwhelmed at the options available. (I'm already aware of Stein's Gate, Umineko, Zero Escape and have put them in my to read/play list)

Absolutely!!

If you like emotional, thoughtful stuff like Umineko: DEFINITELY check out Mamiya!! It’s less well known but so so good. TW for suicide of a trans character in the first route, but said character does get really interesting nuanced good ends after the first round of mandatory bad ends. I also love love love Ciconia no Naku Koro Ni which is the least well known, most recent entry in the When They Cry franchise. It’s not only a really compelling political drama, it has amazing multiplicity representation as well as trans representation. Fata Morgana is another classic, it’s great but check trigger warnings.

For otome: You can’t go wrong with Otomate, Cafe Enchante is one of my favorite dating sims by them. Collar X Malice is another great one!! My BF also loves Bustafellows. I’m working through lots of other games slowly.

For BL: DMMD is the big, famous, high budget, beautiful BL game. Like everything by Nitrochiral it has lots of trigger warnings and problematic tropes, but it’s a very compelling fun game that doesn’t waste your time. I hear good stuff about Slow Damage. I love Hashihime of Old Book Town, but it also has major trigger warnings and the last route… sucks… to me… and is a weird grooming narrative thing… But it’s technically sort of a separate story to the rest of the routes. BL visual novels are generally insane and crazy and full of drama (there are many exceptions but y’know.) One of my favorite new BL things is Promise of Wizards/Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku which is a mobile game that lets you choose to be either a boy or a girl and has the characters flirt with you no matter what! The boy route feels so nice and satisfying. I play in Japanese, but there’s a fan translation page.

I haven’t dipped my toes into Morenatsu or other osukemo type games. I do think Echo is really, really good and Adastra is lots of fun. I’m also only slowly working through the famous hetero VNs like Steins;Gate and White Album. My one piece of advice is never ever ever ever waste your time playing fucking Muvluv. The straight men are lying to you. It fucking sucks.

[theramblingsofadork]

Midnight Thought: Do you think that Dr. Starline’s obsession with video logs became a thing because he wanted to feel like he was being heard?

Like, he started doing them as a way to keep track of his progress, but as the years progressed and he remained alone and isolated— (whether purposeful or not, due to his high intellect and fascination with Eggman) — they sort of became his way to vent, and have a ‘conversation’ with someone? Despite the fact that, in essence, he was only talking to himself and a camera?

(IDW Spoilers beneath the cut.)

I first thought about this when Surge made her comment about him *apparently vlogging so extensively* that he even makes videos about what he makes for breakfast.

While it may just be the tenrec being facetious, we do see quite a few logs across the IDW comics from Starline. And while most appear to be the typical ‘talk about your plans’ shtick, there are a few moments he also has some introspective thoughts, or visibly melts down.

To me at least, it doesn’t seem to be out of the realm of possibility that if Surge isn’t making it up, Starline garnered this habit of making a lot of video logs simply due to not being able to express himself or talk to anyone. Either stemming from his childhood being shoddy—(I imagine someone with his intellect/fascination would have had a hard time making friends)—or because no one else could deal with or understand his ramblings, both good and bad.

This exchange during his and Eggman’s final battle seems to feed into the whole idea even more. Starline definitely would have rambled excitedly to his idol about his inventions, seeing as Eggman would actually be the first to understand whatever scientific jargon he was going on about, and be the most likely to respond positively.

Sadly for Starline, he would still be ignored in the one way that mattered most to him, thus feeding back into this whole unhealthy search for approval and his vlogging loop again. (Y’know, if he had made it out..)

It’s entirely possible I’m looking too much into this, and Starline just really loves the sound of his own voice. But the nuances of how they wrote him give off this whole vibe that there is a possibility of this. And if that is indeed the case, then it’s just really dang sad.

I know he’s a great, horrible™ villain whom we all love to hate, but.. gosh dang it, this platypus gives me so many feels. 😭

[finniestoncrane]

Y’know, there’s one thing I don’t get about Arkham Rids. And it’s the whole bit about him being aro or ace or both. Lots of people say he’s aro/ace because ‘the base nature of (Catwoman’s attachment to Batman) disgusts’ him. And that’s fine. Honestly, I’m disgusted by it too sometimes. And so are some people who aren’t into BatCat in general. The thing that gets me is that people use this one line as evidence or something, and then leave no room for discussion, which I think is a bit stubborn. Yes, their overtly sexual relationship grossed me out too. Yes, I myself am arospec and aspec. But that’s the thing, it’s a spectrum. So while I understand that people get frustrated that he may very well be one of the few characters in media who is aro/ace, people have to understand that 1. It’s a spectrum. Attraction is a very complicated thing. 2. One line, does not a confirmed aro/ace make. And 3. I’m sure lots of allo peeps can be disgusted by a ‘base nature attachment’ as well. Lots of people, regardless of orientation don’t like hearing about what I can only assume Riddler interprets as an extremely sexual relationship that somehow breeded feelings. Which, to me at least, sound more like a demisexual sentiment that a flat out asexual one. It’s fine either way in my opinion. It’s just frustrating to me how some people aren’t open for discussion or nuance. Especially when I myself fall into said nuance.

hello lil beloved! i am not qualified in the slightest to discuss aro/ace spectrum stuff because i am a monogamous slut who loves romantic things

but as for the eddie, i think it's probably coming from two places:

wally wingert said in a cameo i saw once that he can't see the riddler flirting, he doesn't see him being romantic or anything like that. i think he might also have mentioned it in a behind the scenes interview or something? that plus i guess some people think that if he had a woman captive and didn't shoot his shot, then he's not into that? but that's a stretch and a little bit weird lmao

here's the thing though, there's so much eddie does say and doesn't say, and it's all down to how you interpret a character or their tone. some people go MAD for arkham!verse riddlecat, they see sexual tension between them and the way they talk. some people see eddie as canonically bisexual because he's depicted as such in other canon sources. some people see him being repulsed by catwoman or batman or sex in general. which brings me to the second point:

canon doesn't matter a tiny bit when people have their favourites. you can do what you want, you can think what you want. i headcanon arkham!eddie as bisexual, monogamous and autistic, because i can. and because the source material doesn't say that he isn't. and even if it did, it wouldn't stop me lmao which i think is where the big thing with eddie (and a lot of riddlers actually!) comes from. there's that little bit of a suggestion, a lil bit of hope and like you said, people cling to it, because the representation isn't anywhere else for them!

but ultimately people can do whatever they want for whatever reason forever and ever 💚 i know it's maybe annoying when some people won't hear you out about it, but also, they don't have to. which sucks for you, but they're entitled to be stubborn bub!

all that matters is that he's fictional and that people can do what they want with him u-u 💚

[wildpeachfarm]

Sorry to ask, but was that video that is bringing George’s support misogynistic? I see Twitter using the misogyny card and idk if the video was actually misogynistic or Twitter is having another “let’s babying another poor woman without holding her accountable for her bullshit 🥺” moment

I wasn’t able to see the video yet because I’m busy but Y’know

Going to be honest, I've been laying in my bed for the last two days in a mental rut so I haven't watched it myself however, I think a lot of the criticism of misogyny from the commentary youtubers during this situation was not due to the most recent internet archivist video. Rather, the ones before it.

I'll admit a lot of the commentary youtubers have used misogynistic language against caiti and so I think twitter just lumps all the videos together as "all misogynistic". As far as I know and have heard from anons, the recent video is pretty alright.

Twitter is trying to do that thing again where they attempt to have complex discussions with nuance and they just fail miserably because of the character limit and how people are still a little weird about george over there sometimes.

There is this weird line of thinking from some people on twitter that most of george's support is from conservative, incel, men on the internet. When in reality, that's not the case and it's a decent amount of people that fit into none of those categories. I think some people on twitter get blinded by that idea, and proceed to disregard a lot of the discussions happening around caiti's horrible behavior in this situation because they think it's coming from a place of bad faith.

*I want to put another disclaimer that I have not watched the video in its entirety yet so there may be some crazy misogynistic thing said in the video that I haven't gotten to yet, but from feedback I have received a few days ago on the video, that doesn't seem like the case tbh*

[raccoon-queer]

y’know what, I’m going to say it. I’m glad that I’m a system. yeah, having a dissociative disorder is not ideal, but do you know what else is not ideal? being severely traumatized from a young age

being glad that you’re a system is not always an endo thing. yes, a lot of endos claim to be glad that they’re a system because they do not view it as a disorder. but anti-endos can be glad that they are a system and still view it as a disorder because they understand the nuances

I'm glad that I have parts of me that I can talk to, I’m glad that I have parts of me that protect me, I’m glad that I have parts of me that can comfort me. I’m not glad that I am traumatized; I’m glad that I don’t have to be traumatized alone

[sugartwst]

‼️SPOILERS FOR BOOK SEVEN‼️

You know I understand the frustration with Lilia but I also think that there’s some nuance here. I mean looking at Lilia for a second he’s just lost his magic which has been established to 1) be very important to the fae and 2) almost necessary to live in Briar Valley so it makes sense he doesn’t want to go back.

Also this was a very sudden change and one he noted he thought he had more time before. He’s essentially had the rug pulled from under him and now has far less ability to do things he used to. It’s also clear this is a part of aging and therefore means he’s either going towards or into his last leg of life.

All of this that I’ve mentioned to this point (and I believe dropping out of school) aren’t his fault. I doubt NRC would let someone who doesn’t have magic stay. (Yuu being a special exception given it’s the schools fault they are here and wouldn’t have a residence anywhere else).

It’s also like… he’s going through a really major life event, basically equal to a life-altering health complication, I can imagine wanting to leave high school after that.

As for leaving Silver… I honestly don’t think it’s that bad. Don’t get me wrong— Silver is very justified in being upset but most children don’t go to school with their parents and maybe it would be good that he starts to branch off from Lilia like every other child with their parents. I imagine him a lot more worried about Lilia’s health which is something Lilia can’t control obv.

Now do I think he could have broached it better. Yeah lol but also for all the reasons above I think it’s fair to think he did the best he could. After all he did explicitly say this was a surprise to him as well.

Him moving to the East is definitely a choice… but I don’t think a morally wrong one. It’s something he’s said he’s wanted to do when he got old for a while so it isn’t on a whim. It’s definitely going to be the hardest on Malleus who will have a hard time visiting, but he did seem to encourage Lilia to do what he wanted with his end-of-life plan even if it’s not what he wanted.

But as we know, Malleus is starting to overblot but I’d argue this isn’t Lilia’s fault. Lilia trusts Malleus and has enough faith in him to know this will hurt him but he will recover. Loosing people is a part of life.

Malleus really only started his downward slope once Yuu told him that they may be leaving soon (Also not Yuu’s fault lol) and having two people leaving in a way he can’t follow is what’s damaging. I think Lilia is right to think under normal circumstances Malleus would be able to handle him leaving but the circumstances are no longer normal with Yuu’s addition.

I also think it may be fair to add that even with the awareness Yuu was always meant to leave Lilia may not have thought that would happen soon or that Malleus was nearly as attached as he is to Yuu. Hindsight on that sort of thing is 20/20 y’know?

Like I get the frustration with Lilia (cause I’m frustrated too) but some of the Lilia hate seems a bit much. :/

What do you guys think?

🦇💕

[aplaceinthedark]

chapter twelve: PATH that I FOLLOW

Summary: Down in the Shenandoah Valley, there lay a court consisting of the Grim, the Drowned, the Witch and the Watcher.

CW: supernatural themes, mentions of vehicular accident, mentions of motorcycle accident, mentions of religious sacrifice, ptsd, bodily injury, body horror, graphic violence, angst, blood, major character death

Every chapter will have a different cw section. This is Bad Omens rpf, so obviously I don't know all the little nuances of the members or their family members.

A/N: Some things are color-coded. If any of you are colorblind lemme know. 

YOU CAN'T SAVE HIM.

YOU ARE WEAK.

YOU ARE EMPTY.

I tried to scream as Michael’s eyes pleaded. For me? For God? For mercy? I could never tell. How did Jolly’s song go?

We asked Him if He would take us back, He would surely tell us no.

“Mikey, please, hold on,” I pleaded. It felt like I had been saying those words for hours as I tried to scrape my way forward, but either my fingers couldn’t find purchase, or with every inch I gained, another inch of pavement was created.

My head dipped, forehead pressed against the searing hot street. Tears streamed down my face. Was this my own personal Hell? Some kind of divine retribution from a god I stopped believing in when this scene actually happened? Could I not be happy for just once?

I tried summoning some strength using that momentary burst of anger, pushing myself up and shoving myself further. But when I looked up, I could see that I barely moved again. Michael’s eyes seemed to laugh at me, rather than beg for me.

I let out a sob. “Please…”

YOU CAN'T SAVE HIM.

YOU ARE WEAK.

YOU ARE EMPTY.

“Oh, shut up.”

My head shot up at the sound of the familiar voice. “Nick?” I asked, almost a whimper.

“Something like that. It’s kind of complicated, but if it makes it easier, then we’ll just say that’s what I am,” he said, sitting next to me. His clothes were intact, hair thrown up into a messy bun. He looked just like he did when he explained this whole mess to me.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“The leader of the cult cast a malediction on you, attempting to Hollow you out. I’m guessing he was trying to put the Black Stag in someone since his first attempt didn’t work out,” he said.

“Am I… Am I dying?”

“No, no you aren’t dying. But if you give in to despair, It wins, and we’ll lose you.” He looked up at Michael. “Do you really live with this guilt all the time?”

“N-Nick—“

Nick waved his hand, and the horrific scene around us froze. No city sounds. That’s when I realized I couldn’t feel the pain in my side, and felt energized. I pushed myself up to where I could sit.

“Can I wake up now?” I asked.

“No, you’re not dreaming… not really. I’m working on that, but it’s gonna… it’s gonna take a lot. The Black Stag has to take a Vessel, so It’s using the cult leader instead.”

“What do you mean—“

“It wasn’t your fault, y’know?” he said. Nick looked from Michael to behind me, and then to me, his green eyes piercing me. “You feel guilty for not being there for your brother, or for your parents, but there was nothing you could do. I know how that feels, not being there for your best friend. Believe me, it nearly killed me."

“But unlike me back then, you have friends now that can help you, if you let them.”

“Your friend tried to kill me,” I stated flatly.

Nick’s mouth quirked to the side. “Did he now? We’ll have to kick his ass for that later.” He sighed. “Not long now.”

I tilted my head. “Not long for what?”

Nick stood up. “Promise me you’ll forgive yourself? Stress is a killer.”

“What do you mean? Where are you—?”

He held out his hand, and pulled me up when I took it. His hand moved up my arm and curled around the back of my neck, pulling me for a breath-taking kiss. He parted, resting his forehead against mine. “I know we haven’t known each other for very long, but I want you to know that I love you.”

Before I could ask him what was going on, I felt him evaporate from my grasp. Still dazed from his kiss, I slowly opened my eyes, and found that I was no longer on that street near Virginia Beach. I was back in the cold hollow, lying in the dirt.

I started pushing myself up, pain settling back into my bones as I remembered that yeah, I definitely have several broken bones. That’s when I heard something fall to the ground in front of me.

“Nick?”

Noah’s voice was like a bucket of ice water being thrown into my face. I managed to get up, stumbling my way over to where he and Nick were—

Why was Nick on the ground?

“Nick?” I asked, falling to my knees next to him. “Nick?!” I shakily pressed fingers to his neck, placed a hand on his chest. Nothing.

“Nick!”

Nick was dead.

I couldn’t breathe. This couldn’t be happening. This wasn’t real. Nick couldn’t be gone; he just pulled me out of a nightmare.

“No no no no no no no—“ I stumbled over my words. This couldn’t be happening. This was all another nightmare. Another malewhatever Nick had called it.

Then Noah was beside me, shoulder to shoulder, and he was gripping Nick’s shoulders and shaking him, shouting his name and crying. Folio and Jolly stood only a few steps away, the Drowned supporting the Grim from collapsing.

And I was just sitting there, numbly staring down at another lifeless body. “…you have a little piece of me in you, and I love you.”

I had fallen unconscious shortly after Michael died, and I wasn’t there when my parents died. Processing their deaths had been… delayed, for a lack of a better word. And when it was time to truly grieve, to put them in the ground and then move on with life somehow, I did nothing but swallow it down and run off.

Nick? There was no unconsciousness to hide away in. No run-down house in the middle of the woods on a sparsely inhabited mountain to run away to. Here was death, staring me right in the face as it spit on me, and I was going to stand there and take it whether I wanted to or not.

No, this was reality.

That’s when I started screaming. Screaming with every atom in my body as I poured every emotion on the bad end of the spectrum into it. I screamed into the void beyond as if Nick could hear me from there:

“I can't lose you too!”

I barely felt the hand on my back; barely felt the tears that streamed down my face. I couldn’t feel the cold that permeated the hollow, nor the dirt and blood that coated my skin.

“Please, I’ll do anything; give anything, just bring him back. Please!” I pleaded with anything that could hear me, not caring if it was the Woods or the Dark or whatever who answered. “GIVE HIM BACK!”

All I could feel was the invisible string that bound us. That string that we strengthened last night when we came together. That string that first bound us when he healed my wounds. That little red string around my wrist, still there despite the hell it went through, paled in comparison to that golden thread.

I pressed my lips to Nick’s, like I felt compelled to. Like this was some stupid fairy tale and true love's kiss could bring him back. I couldn’t care less that Noah was also there, his forehead pressed to the back of my shoulder, or if I was being watched and judged by Folio and Jolly.

His lips were still warm. I love you, too, I said to the ether, wishing I could’ve told him to his face.

All of a sudden, my stomach lurched, like I was going to throw up. I tried pulling away, but it was like I was magnetized to Nick. A warmth spread from me, up my body, and into my mouth. Like I was a conduit for something greater.

"I had to use some of my own energy…"

“You have a little piece of me in you...”

When I was finally able to pull away, I looked down at his face, his cheeks coated with my tears, and Noah’s as well from the sounds coming from beside. I watched as a warm golden light lit up the veins in Nick’s face, traveling up until they lit his iris’.

As the golden light quickly faded from his eyes, I felt a soft thud below my hand. And then another.

It was like someone took shock pedals to his chest. He took a gasping, deep breath, his back arching violently. With a shout, Noah backed away, but still stayed close to Nick’s side.

Nick settled back down, his chest rising and falling. His green eyes searched until they found mine, wide with disbelief.

And with a groan, he gasped, “Thanks for… holding on… to that…”

My mouth dropped open.

Suddenly, a large something fell on top of us, and it wasn't until I heard the hysterical laughter - or sobbing, I couldn't tell - that I realized it was Noah wrapping his arms around us. Multiple sounds joined him, and I realized I was in the middle of a supernatural dog-pile. Quite literally, when I felt fur shift to warm skin.

“Geroff… can't breathe!” Nick shouted.

The others pulled back, if only by a little bit, but I didn’t lift my head from Nick’s shoulder, even when Nick slowly sat up. It wasn’t until he lifted me off him did I let it settle in that Nick was here with me; he was alive.

I hadn’t let myself believe it until he smiled at me and pushed my damp hair away from my face. Couldn’t believe that I had actually saved someone until he opened his mouth and said two words: “Thanks, Tay.”

And I felt something I hadn’t felt in a long while, something akin to true happiness. And it caused me to burst into tears again. Nick tucked me into his side, trying to soothe me.

Folio was the first to break the silence. “We gotta get out of here,” he said, nudging the body of a headless corpse with his bare foot.

Nick grimaced. “Gimme a second, I need to recuperate.”

Once again, I had forgotten about my broken bones. “Yeah, some of us are only human,” I joked. Nick squeezed my waist, which earned him a small yelp of pain.

As Nick sat on the ground amongst the roots of a great oak tree, leaning back against it for support, I looked over at Noah, who was looking at me instead of Nick. When our eyes met, which I had just realized were almost identical to mine, he nodded.

THANK YOU.

I held his stare for a moment before I mentally shrugged. You owe me.

The only response I got was the sound of low laughter rumbling in my head.

The aftermath of the night was shockingly unremarkable. Jolly, Folio, and Noah did most of the heavy lifting, moving the bodies to a wide part of the river, where the water would carry them off to various silt-covered crevasses. There was nothing left off the cult leader, whoever he was, thanks to Nick. Eventually his body had rotted away to wet dust, so he was left on the forest floor.

Folio and Noah helped me and Nick back to my house, where Folio helped us indoors - Noah’s permission had been revoked, but luckily Nick didn’t know that he had been allowed in in the first place. I’m pretty sure I slept the entire day away.

When I woke up, it was to an empty room save for Jerry, curled up into a black and white cinnamon roll on one of my pillows. I had panicked, anxiety constricting my rib cage to a point of pain. Folio came in and assured me that Nick was outside, sucking a few trees dry of their essence. In the meantime, I was forced onto bed rest with only some pain killers and water to help.

As I stared up at the ceiling of my room, Lydia having come in and curled up next to me, I couldn’t help but notice something felt off about me. Not just the broken bones and the bruises, nor the fact that Nick must’ve changed me into clean clothes. It felt like something was missing from me. Like in the nightmare, the Black Stag had been slightly successful and had hollowed out a tiny bit of me.

It wasn’t until later, when I had woken up from another long rest did I realize what it was. I had woken up with no pain, my head resting on Nick’s thigh as he drew something on a tablet. He gave me a small smile when he saw I was awake. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yeah… Are you the one to thank for that?” I groggily asked, rubbing my eyes to free them of sleep. I hesitantly stretched, but was only met with the faint echo of pain. Like the last remnants of a bruise that you press to feel if something was still there.

“It’s the least I could do for what you did,” he said, putting down the tablet.

“Yeah, about that… Did you…” I trailed off, trying to put into words what I was thinking, “When I was put under that spell, did you try to communicate with me?”

“What do you mean?”

“You were in my nightmare… well after a while you were. You weren't in the bad part,” I hastily said. “But you were there, and you helped me break out of the trance I was in.”

“The malediction?”

“Yeah, that’s what you called it.”

“I can’t communicate through dreams, so I don’t think that was me. Maybe it was your subconscious?” He suggested. He lazily played with a lock of my hair, twisting it loosely around his finger.

“But… It didn’t feel like it! It felt like you were really there,” I said.

We were silent for a few moments, unable to describe what the feeling between us was. Why did it feel so awkward all of a sudden?

He rubbed the red string attached to my wrist between his thumbs. “Was this how you found me?” he asked.

“Yeah, I casted my first spell,” I said, unable to keep the pride out of my voice. I sounded like a small kid showing their parent their first preschool project.

His thumbs stilled. “Oh… That’s what it was,” he said, more to himself.

“Nick, for the love of all that is unholy, we’ve gone through too much for you to go back to being cryptic ‘n’ shit—“

“The ‘Nick’ in your nightmare,” he interrupted me, “was the bit of energy you kept.”

“I kept what now?”

“When I healed your concussion, I had to use my inner power to do it. It’s like… using a little bit of your soul instead of using the Woods. I gave you a piece of myself, and you held onto it until you used it to bring me back.”

“…So that’s how I was able to do your magick? How I talked to you?” I asked. He nodded. I sat up. “Is that why I can’t feel you anymore?”

I already knew the answer before he slowly nodded after a while. The emptiness I felt was the absence of Nick.

“Does that change how you feel about me?” he asked.

I stared up into hopeful blue-gray eyes, and I knew my answer. “You tell me,” I said, caressing his face.

His answer was on his lips.

As for the other members of the Court, Folio and Jolly concerned themselves more with clearing out the woods of any more cultists, which thankfully there were none. They would occasionally visit, whether it was at night or when it rained.

Noah wasn’t as frequent a visitor, though it wasn’t due to jealousy. Nick found out what Noah had done to me when he was gone, and they got into it badly. It took over a month for them to get over it. A bad month, since that was the month of getting Granny’s funeral and assets wrapped up.

After the wake, when Nick was conversing with his family, I had slipped away. During the burial, when the pastor was talking, I felt a pair of familiar eyes peering from the treeline a ways off. The familiar feeling reminded me of my first night here, when I was scared and unprepared for what was out there.

“Come to pay your respects?” I asked the silent spot.

CAN’T REALLY GO OUT THERE AND DO IT PROPERLY, NOW CAN I?

“No, I guess not,” I said, peering over my shoulder. Luckily no one was looking over this way.

IS HE DOING BETTER?

“Yeah, he’s getting there,” I said, slipping my hands into the pockets of my black jeans. Autumn had come to Appalachia, and my black blazer had barely kept off the slight chill. It was weird to think that a month ago, I was practically boiling alive.

Noah and I had forgiven each other before Nick had. I had kept up the offerings, but had changed from apple to carrots for a week straight.

“How's the clean-up going? No more cultists?” I asked.

HAVEN’T SEEN ANY. WE’VE SCARED MOST OF THEM OFF, IF THERE ARE ANY MORE OUT THERE.

“I haven’t heard missing people reports of the ones you guys killed,” I said. Granny’s death and the restaurant guy’s death were the only ones that were being talked about, asking with the mystery of where the killers might be.

POLICE ARE PROBABLY COVERING IT UP.

I nodded, peering over my shoulder again. Nick was looking at me. When he saw that I was looking, he gave me a small smile before turning back to his family.

“What are you gonna do now?” I asked Noah.

There was a rustling sound amongst the trees, and for some reason I imagined him shrugging his shoulders.

SAME THINGS WE NORMALLY DO, I GUESS. HUNT THE PATHS, TERRORIZE LOST HIKERS—

“That’s so not funny, Davis,” I said.

SERIOUSLY, I DON’T USE THAT NAME ANYMORE. IT DIED WHEN I DIED.

“Then stop calling me little rabbit,” I said. I could feel him rolling his eyes, so I sighed, “I gotta call you something besides Noah when I’m pissed at you.”

SEBASTIAN.

“But that’s too long—“

“Who’re you talking to?”

I looked behind me. Nick raised an eyebrow at the treeline.

“No one, really,” I said. I could hear some branches in the woods snapping, and I wondered if I made Noah grumpy. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah, I’m good,” Nick said.

I looped my arm through his as we walked back through the cemetery. With one last parting glance, I shot back to the treeline, Don’t be a stranger for so long.

BE SEEING YOU REAL SOON, LITTLE RABBIT.

One night, about a week after the funeral, I was woken up by a knock at the front door. I panicked for a few seconds, grabbing my phone out of habit, when it buzzed in my hand.

Nick 😺🍌: I’m sorry if I woke you. Let me in please?

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t… I couldn’t sleep in that house by myself,” he sighed as I wrapped my arms around him. I could see his eyes were rimmed with red.

“I know, Nick. I know,” I said reassuringly.

“Can I… stay here? Until the house gets sorted out?” he asked.

“Stay as long as you like,” I said, sighing into his neck. “The cats are already here, anyways.”

He chuckled, the puffs of his breath tickling my scalp. “Thank you.”

We slid into my bed, and he rested his head on my collarbone. “When we were kids, she used to tell us these stories to help us go to sleep,” he said.

“Why don’t you tell me one, if it’ll make you feel better?” I asked.

“Well, if you insist,” he said. And he started telling me this story…

Tysm for reading! Final part coming soon!

[frontierpodiatrist]

clavell character analysis

y’know, while i do like clavell, i think a lot of people sort of underestimate his nuance as a character

while yes, his primary trait is being sort of disarmingly naive or seemingly ignorant of things going on, and just being a bit sillay, and he Does care about his students—i see SO much found family art of him and arven, without like...anyone acknowledging that he’s kind of...not great to him actually? in post-game immediately after turo/sada’s death, he just kind of is like “well you still need credits to graduate sorryyyy” and then says, in essence, he’s proud of everyone and “they all have a role to play”...except for arven, who specifically calls him out on it, and then when arven asks if his role’s obvious, the scene just ends

i’ve also seen mention of him looking away when he says to arven he’s sorry for their loss, and i saw someone mention it’s bc he’s about to cry, but personally, i interpret it more as guilt

what i find most interesting is how much of a role he takes w team star, really stepping up to the plate to help them, and yes i do believe he genuinely wants to help and love his students, just that his relationship with arven (due to his relationship with his parents) is a bit...complicated. but my personal feeling is that while he did also want to help team star bc they needed it, he also already felt guilt for unintentionally ignoring arven, and couldn’t withstand not taking action a second time. in a way, he probably wanted to atone and help other students where he failed to help arven

the way he fondly speaks of sada/turo, and how he refers to them as a dear friend, and how he even conformed their old lab space into his own, it definitely reads as “beyond friendship” and more into a romantic leaning, as a lot of ppl hc, but more importantly BECAUSE of this. because he was blinded by rose tinted glasses, and could only ever really see the good in them/his own relationship to them—that he really just...did not notice what was happening with arven, and not purposefully ignored his own plights, much like the old school did with team star

as what’s seemingly established in the game, arven doesn’t really have an already established relationship with clavell like nemona does, or at least not one that’s said, so to me it seems as if they’re no closer than any other characters. i think a more interesting take on it is that clavell was never able to see the damage being done to arven bc he was so caught up in his own longing for the professor, that by the time he noticed anything was up when arven was much older and acting up/being a delinquent by skipping school and stuff like that (which is when he took up the director position), it was almost too late to intervene

there’s also the fact that based on his dialogue at the beginning he knows they were building a time machine and despite this, never took legal action or anything grand to stop them instead just choosing to...walk away, which i think says a lot about his character, and how they were a sort of weak point of is

that being said, i think found family with him and arven is cute, i just think there’s a lot of unresolved emotional turmoil b/w the two of them by the end of the game that i’ve not really seen anyone talk about but that’s just my two cents ✌️ 😌

them talking in postgame IS interesting, i mean arven doesn’t really have anybody else he can ask about them, but it’s notable also how whenever arven says something like “ig building a time machine is more important than taking care of a child” or “i never bothered to know them” (even though they were neglectful) clavell never goes out of his way to correct him. and i feel as if he would, were it anybody else’s child

to clavell, they WERE special and they still are. he isn’t purposefully alienating arven by speaking about them in such a fond way, but he’s still doing it nevertheless. you can fail with one child (arven) and still succeed with others (penny and the rest of team star) and really i'm sympathetic for him that would be an insane situation to be in

[faded-coat-of-blue]

(ADVANCE NOTICE: This post is spoiler-free)

So having only watched the original Knives Out for the first time last week, and having watched Glass Onion last night and just generally not being someone who enjoys film as a medium (though this is somewhat counterbalanced by me being the world’s biggest slut for murder mysteries)…

Ohhhhhhhhh my god. Oh my god that film was so good on so many different incredible levels and if you follow me here I can already guarantee that you’re exactly the kind of person who would adore it. I’m gonna try and throw some non-spoilery endorsements of it below, because unfortunately tumblr did spoil it quite significantly for me personally (luckily it’s the kind of film where that sorta doesn’t matter too much? Still enjoyable to see the mystery unfold even if you know where it’s ultimately headed)

1) it feels like almost too obvious a place to start, but both the casting and the acting in this movie were top notch. Daniel Craig took the half-caricature of a classic sleuth that he’d already done well in Knives Out and just perfected it. I won’t elaborate too much so as not to spoil characters, but the entire supporting cast felt hugely believable when they needed to be believable and were hilarious parodies when they needed to be funny - particular favourite performances of mine were Kate Hudson, Janelle Monáe and Edward Norton (whom I’ve always rated anyway but y’know), but honestly everyone, whether minor or major role, killed it

2) the political commentary is excellent and a lot more nuanced than you might initially think

3) it was an actually palatable COVID movie? It was truly delightful to see a ‘oh this happens to be set during COVID and like, it was such a big thing that obviously it’s going to influence a lot’ movie that at the same time wasn’t a ‘this is all (or even at all) a “life during COVID” movie’ - it was just there and acknowledged but it absolutely wasn’t integral to the movie

4) as a long-time wrestling fan, hi there, Batista’s dick. We missed you, buddy (for anyone concerned, it’s not ever shown explicitly but like… the speedos are tight)

5) utterly gorgeous set and costume design that (particularly the latter) was actually done with massive consideration for characterisation

6) many incredible (and in one instance downright hilarious) celebrity cameos (which normally I hate but you’ll see why it makes sense in this movie) - particular favourite had to be piss-drunk Yo-Yo Ma (who I’ll admit I only recognised because YouTube had literally recommended me a video of him two hours prior)

I think pretty much everything else I have to say about this film is spoilery but uhhhhhhh

please watch it

Oh and if you’ve seen it and either want to froth at me or you can think of non-spoilery good things that I’ve missed (I’ve already thought of one) please please DM me or reply or whatever

7) every single way in which the Mona Lisa is used in this movie

8) the fact that I can’t put my finger on it but if you’d told me everything I know about this movie from start to finish without me seeing it, I would’ve assumed I was getting Goncharov’ed

[davidmariottecomics]

How I Got Here

Hello,

And happy birthday to me! I got you a present! It’s a blog!

Thanks for joining me for what ought to be a somewhat unusual blog. This one’s both addressing something I’ve been asked many many times and, with luck, maybe helping me sort out a few things for myself. I’m going to be honest… I started writing this in like a fit of imposter syndrome (it’s not just a Sonic mini-series) and depression.

I struggle a lot with my confidence. I think I’m pretty good at what I do and at being a good person, but y’know, between mental illness often not being in line with reality and living and working in the same place most of the time now with a lot of my socialization being online or just through text and just sometimes really burning out from the stresses of my everyday–both personally and professionally–it’s hard. It is hard to be a person right now. It is hard to reasonably do almost anything.

That’s maybe getting away from the point, so to try to bring us back on track… I am a person in a small industry working in what is in some ways an even smaller subsection of that industry–freelancers, people creating comics on their own, outnumber the people working behind the scenes at comic companies making comics many times over. When you have a job like mine, where I work in comics and I work on some beloved properties and I have hiring power and the ability to help people get their foot in the door, you’re frequently asked how you got there? What was your path to success? How’d you become an editor or writer or artist or whatever?

The answer is always different for each person you ask, but a central thread seems to tie us all together: determination, some level of hard work over years, and a whole lotta luck.

So, this is how I’ve ended up where I am.

The Early Advantage

A disclaimer for this whole update: I am an old man (ish–let me have it, it’s my birthday). So, let it just be said that I’m working off of old information. Some combination of half-remembered facts, family lore, and stories from my childhood, that may or may not be fully accurate as I’m not fact-checking them and I may not have always fully understood.

But let’s start when I was very little. Itty-bitty even. One of the first people to know that I had been born–not the first, but certainly within the first couple dozen–was my dad’s boss… Then Wildstorm founder, and now DC Comics publisher, president, and CCO, Jim Lee. Not a bad guy to know practically from birth if you’d eventually like to get into comics. Not that I work with him, but I do and have worked with some former Wildstorm folks and I think this is very indicative of the advantage I had growing up.

So, from birth practically, I was steeped in comics and books. My dad was working at Wildstorm, where he worked in marketing and then in editorial and did his fair share of writing. My mom co-owned Mysterious Galaxy, the San Diego genre-fiction bookstore institution. I was frequently in spaces with people who would later be my peers.

It also meant that I had a lot of access that other people never had or will. I remember being in the Wildstorm offices some days as a kid, and a few years later, in the old IDW ones too. I got to go to DC back in the NY years a couple times. I got to talk to heavyweights in comics and pick their brains and look ‘em in the eye and tell them that some day I’d have their jobs. I got to grow up surrounded by comics and books and the people who made them and to get some real insight to how they work. But, I knew that to make it, I’d still have to work for it, because I saw how hard the people in my life worked too.

One specific story from that time that I think is kinda fun: I was in probably first or second grade and I did that assignment a lot of kids do about “what do you want to be when you grow up?” And while I was probably more in the know than a lot of kids at that age, I wasn’t entirely clear on the nuances of writer vs. artist vs. cartoonist. I knew comics were made by people, and that sometimes the people did one thing and sometimes they did everything, but I wasn’t super clear on what made the difference. And I remember starting that assignment wanting to describe being a writer like my dad, but not fully being able to uncouple the idea of doing the art too. And after it, when I had a clearer picture of what the distinctions were, I think that’s when I really settled into wanting to be a writer.

Gifted Kid

Do you have a period in your life that you struggle to remember? I find that to be the case with a lot of my childhood. It’s one of those things that’s probably nothing, right? The older we get, the less we remember from our youth, and the more it gets filtered down to key events and details–the things that have some major significance or that have been told to or by us enough time we feel we can’t help but remember them. But sometimes I do worry about it. I worry that hindsight isn’t as 20/20 as we say it is and that there are things that’re just slippery–that some part of me thinks I should remember, or that sometimes my mom will talk about like I do remember–but that I just don’t. And when I don’t remember these things, well, it’s frustrating even if it’s not a big deal.

Like, does it matter that I don’t remember the time in my life when I primarily wore sweatpants and cowboy boots? No, though I am retroactively embarrassed for myself. I remember wearing sweatpants–to bed or when exercising, same as I do now, though otherwise I primarily wear jeans (as an aside, since we’re getting personal this time around, my butt has gotten too big and keeps tearing my jeans in the back). And I certainly remember wearing cowboy boots–which I just don’t do anymore. I don’t have a pair, but I do still have a lot of love for a good pair of boots in the right setting. But in spite of how little I know it matters in the grand scheme of my life, I also know that it makes me worry that I can’t remember something like that–the same way I worry when I can’t remember anything. I was talking with Becca recently about feeling like my memory was worse and was it an effect of getting covid and not realizing it, and as they pointed out, it’s probably mostly the fact that I’ve been stressed out kinda non-stop for like… 3 ½ years.

Can you tell I wrote that while feeling more depressed? Anyway, to the topic at hand, what I do remember from this time in my life and that is relevant to how I got to where I am, is that I was a gifted student. I know I have a few international regular readers, so I’ll elaborate in case your school system is substantially different. When we moved from bustling San Diego to the middle of nowhere, Arizona, I went from private school to public school and two very different educational standards. I remember, as an obnoxious, snotty kid, saying at some point that it seemed like the expectations for me through 6th grade in Arizona weren’t any different than the expectations I had already met and exceeded in San Diego in 4th grade.

Shortly after I started at my first AZ school, I tested for gifted and talented and was found to be gifted. What that actually meant was that I tested really well. I had a higher reading level than my peers. I needed more of a challenge in my work–again, likely largely influenced by different standards coming in, and which I think I must’ve gotten, but truth be told, with a small staff in a small town, I don’t really remember getting that much extra attention or challenge to my assignments. I wasn’t a super genius needing to skip a bunch of grades and ready to do complex physics or whatever, but I was needing a little more because I could handle it.

Then I went to high school. I traveled about an hour each way every day because I needed to go to the bigger high school in the bigger town because they had the most honors and AP classes–a way of continuing that “gifted” education and receiving early college credit because of it. There, I ended up having a similar experience. When I graduated, I wasn’t valedictorian or salutatorian, but I was in the top percentile of my class and got to give a speech. It was… a high school graduation speech, alright.

My point, such as it is, is that I spent years working in a school system that kept telling me I was smart–or succeeding in a way my peers weren’t, needing resources that they didn’t–and then rewarding me for good performance. With the benefit of hindsight, sure, it probably wasn’t great that I was being told I was special and different and tying a lot of my self-worth to academic performance, but hey, that’s the American school system for ya!

The critical story from this time period I know I’ve told before. I think it was the summer between my junior and senior years of high school, so when I was really starting to look at colleges and get out applications. I was at San Diego Comic-Con and was at a party with former DC writer, editor, president and publisher, Paul Levitz (one of the people that in my childhood I had once told I would have his job someday). I was talking with Paul about my college plans because I knew that he did some teaching on the side and, well, I figured it’d be good to know how to move forward so I could get his job someday. And I told him that I had been looking at schools with strong creative writing programs and journalism programs and what few schools offered comics programs and he told me that his advice as a person who taught creative writing was you can’t be taught creativity. You can be taught how to refine your writing, and there are some programs that put the emphasis on focusing your skills and helping you improve your storytelling, but there are a lot of people who enter creative writing hoping it’ll foster their creativity, and you can’t teach an imagination. His advice was to pursue something that I would be able to write about–things that I could know and always refer back to as a basis for ideas. I decided to pursue journalism because I had some stories that–fingers crossed, might still get told someday–I thought knowing the real ins and outs would be helpful for. I also figured, journalism is about learning how to research and learning other people’s stories and how to tell them. It ended up being a good fit.

College Daze

It’s kinda funny. I’ve been in comics for 7 years now. Celebrated my 7th IDW anniversary in late August. Most of the people I know and interact with on a regular basis are comics creators, or other creators, artists, readers, fans, people in the community at large. But sometimes I get that shock of no matter how mainstream comics may seem, for a lot of folks, they’re still a novelty. Like when I got my haircut last and the stylist had no real idea what my job was. And without a doubt through my own doing, I had a reputation even through college as “comic guy” because both to people with a shared interest and people who barely knew me, that was the fact they knew about me.

College was probably the first time in years that I had made a full comic. And the ones I made were not very good. But, over my years there, I took a few classes that involved comics heavily (including a really amazing comics geography class that was examining comics as a tool of non-fiction storytelling) and in the course of those, made a couple little comics. Y’know, one or two page things as assignments, but something that I had to write and draw and letter all by myself. Having to do that made me really start to think about the tools of making comics. I had never stopped reading comics, I had never stopped thinking about comics, I had to read Understanding Comics and the other Scott McCloud books like 5 times for different classes, but I had so fully bought into being a writer that I hadn’t tried to make my own comics really in a long time.

I had a couple false starts as a writer. I had a series I was working on with my dad that ultimately didn’t go forward and my only regret about that is not having had the chance to work with my dad. I did a comic script as my honors thesis. I got a surprisingly good grade on it considering how weak I think it is. I have not chosen to revisit it because in hindsight, it was not a good script and was a pretty flawed premise.

But what I really got into in college was editing. In my journalism classes, and working on the Daily Wildcat, I got to spend some time learning editorial skills and in the trenches. And, as it turned out, for as much as I loved writing for myself, I also was pretty good at helping other people find their stories, find their angles, clean up and clarify their copy, check their facts, etc. It was also around that point–and around the point of my first *real* job in the home department at Dillards that I realized editorial also had the perks of regular paychecks and healthcare.

I didn’t focus on editorial in an official capacity. It’s not like I have a degree in journalism with an emphasis on editorial or anything, but I knew it was something I was increasingly interested in pursuing and really busted my chops to try to get good at it. For as difficult as it is to bust out an article in a daily paper because someone blew their deadline or turned in something unpublishable, it is actually far harder to adjust on the fly in comics because I can’t just write something and plug it in.

The other major influence on me and comics in college is, of course, it’s where I met and fell in love with Becca. When we first met, they liked comics, but had largely given up on that part of their ambitions. Like, they were a political science major that had danced around also doing theater because they loved acting and maybe wanted to be a politician and maybe wanted to be an actor and maybe wanted to be something else, but being an artist, much less a comic artist was not a thing they were really thinking. And now, that’s what they do and what they work on so much of the time and with me sometimes and y’know, I could not do what I do now without them in my corner and vice-versa, I don’t think.

My Real Secret to Success: A Broken Car

Those are the factors that really led me to comics. I grew up in it. I had connections. I learned about it myself and in school and throughout my life, and was rewarded for the work I put into learning about comics and learning everything else. I fell in love, and I fell in love with editing. And so I graduated with a journalism degree with a minor in gender and women’s studies and was ready to face the world… by briefly kind of illegally living in my friend’s back bedroom for a few months because I was unemployed and unemployable!

In the middle of the hot Arizona summer, I get a message from my friend Shannon Denton. He’s working on the Alan Tudyk webseries Con Man and they’re shooting the finale and need people for a fake comic convention and he’s heard Becca’s interested in acting. It’d be background stuff, but it could be a little something–a first step, first gig in LA. Plus, we’d get to see each other!

And so, 4th of July weekend, Becca and I drive out to LA for filming! Now, to backtrack (and forward and sideways) a little… I have not great luck with cars. My first car of my own was an old family car that was gifted to me and was rear ended only a few months into owning it. It was messed up–not actually undrivable, probably, but the extent of the damage was more than the rest of the car was worth, so it was deemed totalled. And because it was a car of little value, I took my little payout and bought another crappy car. It was fine for what it was. Except when it started giving me the check oil light. I took it in to get the oil changed and apparently brought it to the dumbest, worst mechanics in town. I say this because…

Back to LA. We’ve been there a couple of days, but the car’s starting to drive a little funny and make some funny sounds and the check oil light’s back on. So, we stop at a mechanic and say “hey, can you look at this? I just had it in the shop!” And the mechanic looks at it and does his whole thing and says that whoever looked at it last screwed me over. The cap to the oil tank was shattered, so it wouldn’t screw in properly and the car could no longer safely hold oil and the oil that had been in it had now gotten into all sorts of other parts of the engine and the engine would have to be replaced, which once again, would’ve been more than the value of the car.

Now, stepping back again for one second. We’re staying with our friend Henry Barajas while we’re in LA. And while I’m at Henry’s place, I see a job posting for an editor gig at IDW (I would later learn that it was to replace John Barber). I go through it and I’m not qualified at this point. But, Henry encourages me to apply, so ultimately he’s like making dinner and conversation with Becca while I sit at his kitchen table and fill out this application, certain I’m not going to get the job.

The mechanic sees the AZ plates and asks if we’re local or if we’re staying with anyone. I tell him that my mom lives in San Diego. He says super, that’s about as far as you can go. You cannot drive back to Arizona with this car, it will not make it there. And be careful if you’re driving this down to San Diego. Becca and I do it. We drive it down, park it in the driveway of my mom and stepdad’s place, and that’s where the car died and was eventually picked up and donated from. But through some pretty convenient timing, I hear back from IDW. I am right, I’m not qualified for the editor position. But they haven’t yet posted that they’re also looking for an editorial assistant–a ground-level opening. And if I can make it there, I can do an interview with Chris Ryall. So it was that my car dying set me up to be in San Diego and do the interview.

It went well. Chris and I knew each a little, from my dad’s time at IDW, though obviously very different with me as an adult rather than a kid. It went well, and I eventually went back to AZ and waited to hear back. I got to San Diego Comic-Con and very nervously approached the IDW booth one day and talked to Chris and he said I had it, just had to finish up the paperwork on their end, and within a month, I had signed the papers and started at IDW.

And now I’m here. I've been trained by amazing people and have worked with so many fabulous creators (and still have such a wishlist of people I'd like to work with one day). I spend 5 days a week (though honestly, sometimes it seems like more) doing editorial work, and trying to write on top of and between that. I’ve got a couple comic series under my belt and lots of stories I’d still like to tell. And I bust my ass every day to bring people comics. Being in editorial, it is a sometimes frustrating job. A job that does not get a lot of credit. And a very difficult job. But it’s my job, and the highs are the best thing in the world.

I still struggle. I think that’s evident, even in how I tell my story about whether I’m actually justified in being here and doing this and if I’m any good at it. I told a friend recently that I have an easier time inviting my peers to my wedding than asking them if they’d like to work on a silly little story with me because for some reason, it feels like that’s going to be a bother or they’re not going to treat me as a serious creator. But that’s my comics story and I expect there’ll be a lot more to come from me in the future.

Thanks for reading. Amended features below!

David

What I enjoyed this birthday: Birthday cards, gifts, art, and messages! People who bought my Kofi mystery bundles (last call)! People who subscribed to my Patreon (mystery bundles til Halloween at $10+, plus a Wreckers #1 script dissection coming this weekend)! People who sent me $$$ because it's my birthday because, boy, I need 'em (see Kofi link above...)! Blank Check (Podcast), Solve This Murder (Podcast) , Craig of the Creek (Cartoon), One Piece (Manga), Pokemon Violet (Video game), The Archive Undying by Emma Mieko Candon (Book), Yu-Gi-Oh: Duel Links (Video game), The Traitors (TV show), Mothership (This funky space "tiki" bar in town! It's themed around having crashlanded on an alien planet, so like half the bar is what's left of your ship and the other half is like the natural cave formation and the weird irridescent plant life and stuff. It's really cool). 

New Releases today (10/18/2023): No new books from me this week. :C But maybe spend the money you would've spent today on a mystery bundle or Patreon membership or something in my shop or something from Becca (remember, there's even more on Becca's Patreon and itch and other things accessible via their contact page)! 

Or put your money to something good like the Palestine Children's Relief Fund, Doctors Without Borders, or UNRWA. It's hard because a lot of this money is anticipatory given the situation in Gaza (and the West Bank) and at time of writing, resources are being extremely restricted, if getting through at all. Or if you want to feel like you're having more immediate action, there're still plenty of ways to give for relief in Ukraine, which is also still under siege. 

Or if money is a big ask, which, like, I get it, maybe you can give some time to something important. The Jewish Voice for Peace Action has made an easy to fill out form to write your representatives to encourage defunding and deescalating the Palestinan genocide. You can still submit your comments on "Generative AI" to the copyright office (they've actually extended the submission period). You can write to your reps to tell them to stop KOSA. You can get involved with your local library, or attend a legislative session of some sort, or otherwise take action in what you believe in because, again, things are bad right now and there is so much evil and injustice to stand up against, be it book bannings (and publishers giving in to extremists) or transphobia or worker exploitation or all of the above! 

Announcements: It is my birthday. See above! 

Pic of the Birthday:  I will post actual birthday pictures when I have them, so this weekend's blog. In the meantime, final plug for my bundles! 

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #563

Top Ten Moments in The Transformers’ Lost Light Saga

I’ve written about Transformers a lot on here. I’d be surprised if it wasn’t the single thing I’d written blogs about the most (followed by the MCU and then, I dunno, probably Hey Duggee). It’s the biggest “thing” in my life – the media franchise I enjoy and engage with the most. And I’ve definitely ranked favourite moments before. But I wanted to return to it – yet again – for a couple of reasons.

2012 marks the ten-year anniversary of my favourite run of Transformers, across its entire nearly-forty-year history: the comics More Than Meets the Eye and Lost Light. These comics, written by James Roberts in collaboration with several artists (but predominantly Alex Milne and Jack Lawrence), tell one epic tale of friendship, tragedy, comedy, political discourse, allegory, and references to obscure British pop culture. As it happens, I’ve re-read the entire series whilst on tour with the BBC, so it’s all fresh in my mind; also another reason to revisit it in a list.

There’s another, kinda serendipitous reason to look back over IDW’s time with Transformers. This week just gone, the last ever Transformers book published by IDW was released. It is, I think, sixteen years since they first had the licence, and the breadth of great comics they’ve produced – from the first Infiltration series by Simon Furman and EJ Su to the most recent continuity written by Brian Ruckley, by way of MTMTE, Robots in Disguise, Furman and Andrew Wildman continuing their nineties G1 run in Regeneration One, and the recent sort-of-not-in-continuity Last Bot Standing by Nick Roche and – him again – EJ Su – is remarkable. It’s a hell of a run, the best the franchise has ever been handled by one company. No film, no animated series, no other published comics come close for me. How the merry hell do they follow this?

For the first time, though, I’m singling out one specific arc – the Lost Light Saga, for want of a better title (I would also consider “Sad Gay Robots in Space”) – and just picking the best bits. I’m also doing deep on why they’re the best. And I’m going to try to say where you can find this great bit of a great comic!

This is a celebration. I want that to come through. I hope that when all is said and done – and this might end up being my last word on the Lost Light – that the myriad reasons why I adore this series is evident. The nuance of the writing, the fidelity of the artwork, the breadth of the allusion, the comedy, pathos, empathy, sadness, love. It’s a masterful piece of work that had me tearing up multiple times, sometimes over bits that I didn’t remember or that just didn’t hit me first time round.

Also, y’know, spoilers. I’ll put a break in. But if you do want to enjoy the saga in its entirety, maybe don’t read this list. Buy the paperbacks, get it on Kindle, scour your local comic shop for back issues. And then maybe you’ll join me in wishing happy birthday to the greatest iteration of my favourite franchise.

And I really want to emphasise that. Transformers really is my thing. it was the first cartoon and comic I fell in love with. It’s remained more important to me than, say, Star Wars or the MCU, or other childhood loves like Ghostbusters, Turtles, and even my beloved orange meatball with stripes, Garfield. Transformers is really the only thing I can see myself going to conventions for on the reg, a thing that just speaks to me, that I get unequivocally nerdy about. I wouldn’t say it’s like a religion but it probably occupies the same irreducible part of my soul that, like all the cultural bits of Catholicism, will never leave me, no matter what. And all of that – the length and breadth of it, the joys and sorrows, the heart and soul – my favourite bit of Transformers are these comics. I think I’ve said it before, but they achieved something.

“Don’t change back”: the arc of Megatron becoming an Autobot was one of those it’ll-never-work things that did work, and it worked so damn well. It became an examination of corruption and ideology and self-determinism and, well, the nature of tyranny, but also guilt and acceptance. Megatron, now a determined pacifist, is compelled back to violence to defend his new friends, but in doing so slaps a Decepticon badge over his Autobot one. When the dying Ravage – always sceptical and disapproving of his former boss’s change to the red team – notices, he reaches his hand out to touch the badge and says “don’t change back”. Back to what? Back to being an Autobot? Or back to being a Decepticon? These were his last words, and we’ll never know what they mean. And I really need to underline, Ravage is one of my favourite characters, and this is how he died. It just helps to underline the massive schism in Megatron’s psyche, his own continued self-doubt, the betrayal his former friends now feel, and – yes – his continued guilt. Quite how this ridiculous plot thread, imposed upon the writer by the publisher, turned into the cornerstone and most compelling element of the entire run is just exceptional writing and character work.

“Even Team Whirl”: this is two-fold because it’s a great moment and a call-back. The first time we see Whirl he’s about to kill himself. He’s filled with self-loathing because he’s been abused and mistreated, he’s a violent loner who’s alienated all his friends, and because he might have started the war in the first place. He’s a horrible person who we don’t really like but very slowly we grow to love him as he opens up. And then when Rodimus gives to inspire everyone he includes Whirl – “even Team Whirl” he says – and Whirl does seem to notice. Then, at the very end, Whirl has enough self-belief in his own latent goodness that he can open the Matrix, saying to himself “Even… Team… Whirl…”. So it’s partly the story of Whirl’s redemption and how he learns to believe in himself, and also a story about how Rodimus is just a cool guy and super-inspiring.

“Goodnight, little one”: after Getaway grooms and gaslights Tailgate, he outlines the four steps a Transformer takes to codify their relationship (basically, wedding vows). Tailgate is rescued by Cyclonus, but as they’re pinned down by security forces, we see the four steps play out again: actions that Cyclonus has taken over the years – instinctively, selflessly, without thinking – that prove how much he’s always loved Tailgate. It’s a heartbreaking encapsulation of their relationship when Tailgate realises all of this, realises Cyclonus is the right one after all. Then Cyclonus is shot to pieces.

“Megatron was able to open it when you couldn’t…”: might need a bit of explaining this, but the whole saga ends with the team opening multiple Matrixes (Matrices?) at the same time. Except they only open if you feel like you deserve to open them, that you’re good enough. Throughout, Rodimus has been an egocentric do-gooder who wants everyone to think he’s ace; that he’s a true Prime, essentially. He opens his Matrix effortlessly. But later he tells a court that he couldn’t open it, but Megatron could; he lies to the universe to try to get them to pardon the guy who started the war and once tried to kill him. This evolution of their relationship and his own personality is so beautifully sad and, ultimately, heroic. Like a true Prime.

“I love you”: why are so many of these sad? Despite what I said about Tailgate and Cyclonus, the defining relationship of the series is Chromedome and Rewind. One can read people’s minds by injecting their skulls; the other is constantly recording everything and saving the footage to a vast database. When Rewind dies, Chromedome wants to remove the memories of his dead love from his own mind; but a recording by Rewind, spliced together from dozens of different videos, leaves him a beautiful but tragic message from beyond the grave, culminating in three very simple words. Chromedome decides not to wipe his own mind.

“Remember me as I was”: one of the best long-running arcs in the series was the frequent flashbacks to old Cybertron (we’ll see more of this later). The mysterious, unnamed senator who befriended Orion Pax – with his vibrant, ever-changing colour scheme and propensity for emotional outbursts – is a mysterious and slightly sinister character. What’s his game? Is he grooming Orion? And then as the real sinister villains take over, the scale of the senator’s punishment is horrific and severe and we discover that his face, hands, and entire personality has been irrevocably altered, and he was in fact the cold, emotionless, logical Shockwave, one of the most notorious Decepticons. It’s a terrific origin for a popular character, suitably shocking and unexpected; a great twist.

“We’re going to steal the Matrix”: still back in the past for this, another classic cliffhanger ending. After establishing Orion Pax as the supercop who can’t be stopped, we have a number of plot threads converge as the scale of the evil Cybertronian Senate and the sinister, fascistic Functionists becomes apparent. Knowing what must be done, Orion hatches a simple but impossible plan: steal the Matrix. It turns a flashback mystery-cum-character piece into, all of a sudden, a Cybertronian heist movie; Orion’s Eleven. And it is, of course, excellent.

“It happened off-panel”: it’s a funny book, this, and sometimes you just need a good gag. I was tempted to include the Holiday Special and its “Contrivance Engine”, but really my favourite of the Red Dwarf-style silly sci-fi gags is the Meta-Bomb – “it blows a hole in the fourth wall”. Swerve – comic relief with a tragic backstory – presses it and instantly becomes a sort of metafictional narrator, semi-outside of the narrative, not quite Deadpool but a step removed. The fact that this gag, making use of and fun of the comics medium, is great in and of itself is one thing; but it also sets up further developments down the road. And that’s the funny thing about comedy; the banter and the gags makes you fall in love with the characters, so when a writer twists the knife it hurts that much more.

“Tell Whirl he can have my hands”: Ratchet is a grumpy doc with a heart of gold, but it’s the grumpiness that comes to the fore more often. His Spock/McCoy banter with Drift is a solid part of the story’s early years, and one would be forgiven for thinking Ratchet was a hard, flinty sort. But when the chips are down – faced with a rampaging Overlord and certain death – he doesn’t flinch for a second, defending the needy and immediately barking orders, bestowing favours and generosity. Whirl’s loss of hands and the abuse that loss signifies is a great weight on his soul, and instantly Ratchet offers to alleviate that. It’s so fast, so instant a thought, that its generosity takes me by surprise.

“It’s not funny at all. It’s tragic”: we end where we began, with Megatron’s redemption, and once again with a fashback narrative – here Megatron talking via a sort of time travel phone with not-Optimus-yet Orion Pax. Pax, assuming he’s talking to the Megatron of his own time, is a big fan of his future foe, wants to get him to join the fight; Megatron, speaking from the future, drops a couple of cryptic references to their eventual animosity. There are shades of Macbeth or Milton’s Satan when he says he couldn’t turn back now even if he wanted to, but he acknowledges he will join Pax “eventually”. Tragic doesn’t cover it.

There we are then. I don’t know what else to say. I’m sad it’s over but I’m happy it happened. We achieved something. Oh boy.