#one final + one project down

[ashesforart]

KISS RN 💥💥 DO IT KISS KISS RIGHT NOW I DARE U 💥💥 BET U WON'T

[heartorbit]

holy quintet looks kind of different

[skitskatdacat63]

Fernando Alonso & His Relationship With Cards

I'm sure we're all familar with the cards on the back of Fernando's Vegas GP helmet by now, but did you know his relationship with cards goes a lot deeper?

I. Magic Tricks

You've probably seen or heard someone at least mention Fernando's propensity for card tricks. As far as I can tell he was doing them(publically) as far back as 2003 all the way to as recently as 2018. Even once performing a card trick, with a condom and a teddy bear(!??!?!??!!), in front of Valentino Rossi who said "How was that possible?"(x)

But how did this start? According to James Allen, "Fernando admits to having been heavily influenced by his grandfather, a mercurial figure, who taught him magic and card tricks, still one of his passions away from the race track."(x) And I'm not sure the validity of this one, because I couldn't find an actual source, but apparently he once said: "My parents are responsible for the two things I like doing most - driving and magic tricks. They bought me my first go-kart and a magician's kit."

In several interviews he described it as his hobby off track, and that he loved learning new tricks and surprising others in the garage with them! So clearly cards are pretty important to him both as a hobby but also to who he is as a person since they've been with him just as long as racing has.

II. Card Symbolism in His Helmets

This is the reason I originally made this post, but I thought I should also explain the origins of his card fascination first. As I said, we probably all remember the cards on the back of his helmet in Vegas, but did you know that wasn't the first time he had cards on the back of his helmet?

From 2008-2013, he used to have a pair of cards on the back of his helmets. The symbolisms of the cards themselves as well as the evolution of their design is really fascinating to me! Even more so with the recent development of the card choice in 2023.

Fernando said he wanted to reference his two titles in some way on the back of his helmet and after his friend sent him several ideas, he decided on having two cards(an ace of clubs and an ace of hearts, sometimes pictured with 05 and 06 on them as well), saying: "I picked the cloverleaf [the ace of clubs - Ed] to give me luck, but the only pity is that it doesn't have four leaves!"(X)

2008.

Here's the very first appearance of the cards! They're displayed flat, with the 05 and 06 clearly visible

2009.

Very similar to 2008, but with a slightly different design, and they're maybe a bit more straight with less shadow?

2010.

This is the first major change! I was sad they didn't have the years on them anymore, but then I realized they're sparkly to match with his signature lightning bolts on the top of the helmet!!

2011.

Honestly I'm still somewhat unsure if this is the actual 2011 helmet? It's pretty difficult to find clear photos of the back of helmets from older seasons. It's easiest to find them on replica sites or auction sites so I'm not 100%? But anyways, I like that this has the championship years on the underside of the cards

2012.

This is when I started getting weirdly emotional about the helmets. Do you see how they've progressed from being a centerpoint to being curled up and sad at the bottom of the helmet? Not listing the year anymore??

2013.

Same thoughts as 2012. And after this season, they cease to exist (just like his ferrari chair in the garage, WOAH CALLBACK), until cards make a reeappearance in his Vegas helmet, albeit in a different form

2013 Monaco(Honorable Mention):

For some reason 2013 helmets were easier to find proper pictures of, so I happened to witness this absolute beauty. The creativity of this helmet genuinely blows me away??? Wanting to keep the card motif, but making sure to incorporate it into the rest of the puzzle piece design?? Mwah! There was another special 2013 helmet but they didn't change the cards at all so I really applaud this one

2023 Las Vegas(The Return of The King):

The magnificent return! But look! The cards are different cards! Instead of being two aces, it's now an ace of hearts, a four of hearts(his driver number of course!) and, the, now iconic, representation of himself as a Joker. I literally could not believe my eyes when this helmet was released and I saw the Joker card, what a fucking silly old man....I really wonder if he felt nostalgic having cards on his helmet again or if he didn't think about it all and was just like, "ah cards because Vegas!!!"

III. Why Does This Matter?

*The rest of the post was factual, this is moreso my personal thoughts on the symbolism of the cards/designs

This post spawned from me recently watching the 2010 Bahrain gp and noticing "hey wait a minute...are those CARDS ON THE BACK OF HIS HELMET!?" It's a really tiny detail that's unfortunately covered up by the HANS device pretty much whenever he's wearing the helmet, so it's really difficult to spot! But I became fascinated with the fact that he had cards on his helmet before that recent helmet, and now here we are!

There's something to me about how the design of the cards evolves over the course of six seasons from the cards being front and center to being smaller, more folded up and closer to the bottom of the helmet. As I said, the 2012-2013 ones genuinely made me depressed because it feels, symbolically, like his hopes for getting another Ace are becoming more and more unlikely and falling away until they eventually fall falt and fade away entirely after 2013 and disappear for basically a decade.

But when they return? They're not the same cards! Instead of representing Fernando's championships, they now represent him as a person, displaying his driver number and his persona of being a Joker!! Though I do think it's interesting he happened to keep the Ace of Hearts, even though he talked more about the Ace of Clubs before. I'm not sure it's actually this deep in reality, but I like to think that it's him not letting his championships(and the lack thereof) define him, but rather letting who he is as a person shine and be the centerpoint instead! But on a sadder note, as @suzuki-ecstar said to me, maybe the Aces aren't there anymore because he's lost all hope for a chance at a third Ace entirely :(

[isbergillustration]

Things Are About To Get Significantly Fucking Worse

[reluctantlyanimating]

Since yall liked the last one that much here’s this other wip i had in store lol

It’s (hopefully) gonna end up with some fun struggles training toothless (because he’s a madlad) and horrowcow (because she’s sleepy) where Fishlegs progressively gets HORRORCOW to listen but Toothless shows no improvement whatsoever sob

[inkclover]

E.G.O. of an Angel(a)📚🪶

*spins around and then trips over me feet*

[murdleandmarot]

A quick bluebelle painting :))

[kirisclangen]

Larchpaw

She/her, 8 moons, cis molly

[liquidchocolatecake]

currently captive audience to a knock down drag out fight in my brain between desire to respect the wishes of the creator and not look for anyone redistributing the comic and god i fucking miss wonderlab i miss wonderlab so much you have no idea i want wonderlab back so bad

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[miodiodavinci]

collapses to the ground like a deflated balloon

[kathybluecaller]

I just think they’re neat :]

[send-me-a-puffalope]

why did my teachers think it was okay to give us like one single weekend to finish all of our midterm projects and study for our tests.

[journeyman-tier-fibercraft]

I finished one project that means I get to cast on one more right?? Even if I have 8 wips?????

At some point, I lost my favourite scarf. I've been using my shawls instead but they're really big and are slightly harder to style than said favourite scarf (it was blue/dark green and matched a lot of my clothes). While I was checking out yarn, trying to decide if it would be worth to reknit my old scarf when I might be able to find it, I saw this cute yarn! Butterfly by Premier Yarns, it's made for shawl knitting with 2/3rds of the yarn being solid and the last 1/3rd being striped.

Premier Yarns is possibly the most hit or miss of all the yarn brands I've used but when it hits, I really like them. I'm still not 100% sure either way with this particular yarn but it's probably a hit, it's very soft and nice in stockinette (I didn't want to deal with curling so I went with full garter, which is Fine in this yarn). It is pretttyyy splitty, but not so bad I have to consistently look at it while knitting.

I'm only halfish? following a pattern right now. I knew I wanted a crescent shawl (aka 6 increases every other row) and found one but honestly I've already changed so much from the original it's pretty much not even the same pattern. I still have it listed as the pattern I'm working on in Ravelry but that's only if I use the lace from the pattern, which I'm undecided.

[ra-vio]

semester is almost over. im dying

[good-beanswrites]

oomph i know i'm definitely really early with this ask (changing time zones for vacation is weird o.O) but I was thinking about it over the past few days

for the lights, camera, sing your sins au, are the interrogations somewhat scripted where the prisoner knows what to say and Es is mostly just reactions or questions to that? I feel like we've talked about this but I have forgotten jandjnf o.O

because all i can think about is Es getting beaten up or close to tears in the first voice dramas and man if it's scripted, i feel bad for the prisoners who have to do this to es o.O

Hi Mug :D No worries, a slightly late reply because I was on vacation too haha! 🍂

And I mean it's whatever works best in people's minds, but I always pictured there being very little scripted, actually! I'd hoped that everything was as natural as possible. The prisoners just have to make the little shift to act as if they did follow through with the murder instead of talk about how close it came -- other than that, everything that happens is the characters' honest questions, answers, and reactions.

When explaining the no-violence ban to everyone, Fuuta and Kazui (and later Amane) tell Jackalope how they would think during their interrogations. Jackalope instructs them all how to act in order to stay consistent with the barriers/losing strength stuff. I think the only explicitly scripted action is Mikoto's violence, since Red admits he may resort to that if Blue felt threatened. Jackalope tells him to get to the point of violence no matter how the interrogation goes, as it's necessary (to proving Mikoto's situation, to driving home the central ideas of Mikoto's case, to reveal Milgram's process and 'limits,' etc).

And yeah, it definitely tears him apart to actually do it -- he has to verify that Es signed up for this several times (which they did), and it still takes a lot of resolve to follow through with hurting an innocent kid like that. I imagine that's one of the reasons he's not really upset that Kotoko surprised everyone by intervening: he felt so guilty about the attack and was grateful someone came in to stop it.

Although it wasn't physical pain, Mahiru is also really upset that she brought Es such emotional strain. She thinks it's cruel to fool them into feeling bad for her when she's okay, and it takes a lot of reassurance from the others to convince her it's for the sake of the experiment -- every part of the process has toyed with everyone's emotions, she's not a terrible person for doing so.

Whether in the middle of the trial or the final executions, I think any characters who die next trial will also feel awful for making Es mourn for them when they're still alive. It's not all one-sided guilt, though. It's balanced by anger/sorrow towards Es for condemning them to death in the first place because of their decisions. Any time they get too caught up in thinking "I'm so cruel for tricking them like this," they have a moment of "well, they did specifically order my death, so..."

When I'm looking for a pure fix-it, I'll let those emotions go pretty easily <3 But unfortunately my writer ass is never free from The Themes asdfsdf and sometimes I still get caught up in the project's major focus -- not only is Es facing the original Milgram dilemma of choosing whether or not to follow authority, but now the prisoners are faced with the exact same decision. Do they physically/mentally hurt this child "for the experiment?" Because someone in authority told them to? They're doing this to prove a point about justice and fairness, but where should they draw the line? At what point is it not for the greater good and they are just causing more harm?

I think I mentioned it before but in this au the prisoners are extremely motivated by the promise that this experiment will help others like them. Yuno wants to make a statement about society's views on abortion and sex work. Muu wants to make a difference for bullying victims. Kazui hopes to be a voice for all those who have had to keep theirs quiet about something. Mikoto hopes his story creates more awareness and acceptance for people who are usually terribly stereotyped and feared. Kotoko wants to bring to light the problem of corruption and what can be done about it, and so on. In the end, they can always justify causing a little emotional/physical harm because they are doing it for a good reason.