#phew baby this is the first time i've done and posted one of these

[slishthelovemachine]

[I just wrote an entire fucking review for Planetes and it got deleted by me pressing ctrl+x but is no longer present in my clipboard. I am going to scream and writhe. Here's another try.

I finished Planetes at 0200 hours this morning after a 16 hour shift on the ambulance. I read the last few short volumes of Planetes on a shift with a man I've worked with plenty of times. I felt a connection with the broader set-up of Planetes that, upon some reflection, might change how I operate as a human being who makes her living on the forefront of tiny histories in tiny people's lives with various doodads and machines in a hulking metal box. Y'know, like astronauts, or something.]

Planetes (1999-2004, Yukimura Makoto) is a manga about space, Space as a character, and all the little people who come to rest in that glittering black quilt of ice-death that is it's vacuum. The story follows Hachirota "Hachimaki" Hashino, a young man from a family of astronauts in a near-future where humanity's Cold War era space ventures never stopped. Hachimaki works with a colorful crew on a debris collecting ship, collecting the trash orbiting the Earth to keep supply and travel orbits free. The job is thankless but deeply important, something frequently expressed by everyone else but Hachimaki, who bristles at the lack of grandiosity in picking up space-refuse.

Hachimaki develops and matures as a young man in space, and those developments come when he faces Space with his ever-evolving Self and receives different revelations in return. These revelations are preceded by explorations of the lives surrounding Hachimaki's own, buffeting him with challenges and proof of the lessons he needs to learn with their own grounded complexities. I could write a lot on those lives, but I won't, because they're believable and textured in a way that feels very good to witness firsthand. So read Planetes and do that. I wouldn't do it justice here.

Yukimura's background and environment art makes for a very believable space future. The manga itself is rife with extra technical documents and concept pages (especially in the last volume) that serve as a hefty eye-meal for anyone even remotely excited by technical design and lore-shit. Yukimura's art lends itself to both quiet, grand scenes of haunting introspection and speech-bubble-loaded busy exposition pages. Warm smiles and declarations of love hit as hard as the few brief action scenes in the earlier volumes with Yukimura's bright, mature style. Planetes is as gripping visually on Earth as it is on the surface of the Moon or the cargo holds of trash-collecting ships and space stations.

Space (as a character separate from the literal thing being explored, here) is represented in a few ways throughout the manga. Sometimes, it is a white cat representing the divine indifference of the Universe at large, and sometimes it is a black cat representing the terrible death that occupies more of the vacuum than not. Sometimes Space is portrayed as Hachimaki himself, though a dark and bitter version of him, pushing him toward breaking himself on the bow of humanity's insatiable need to conquer and know.

All of these moments serve to answer the biggest (and only the biggest) questions any person truly infatuated with space has come to. Why are we up there in the first place? Should we even be "up there?" Is our purpose to die up there, or is our purpose to live? Is just living enough?

The author Yukimura Makoto answers all of these with warmth. Space is about surviving. It is about life and death itself. Space is where we are now--standing, staring up at the stars, numb to the grand warmth they sent to us from places we will never see as more than pinpricks in a vast and smothering fabric. Space is not a place to escape what makes us human. Space is about love, loneliness, marriage, nations, war--space is about everything a human being brings to it, because all we can bring to space is everything we have, and everything we have is all we will ever know.

Planetes is beautiful. Planetes grabbed 26 year old me by the ears and made me look back at 16 year old me who used to stare at space with awe and hope and wonder and said What happened? Then Planetes hugged me and said It's alright. Space isn't going anywhere. Through all the strife and misery on Earth here at the end of history, Space isn't going anywhere. Like a character in Planetes's mother tells her when she is a child: "When you can't stop crying, you're supposed to look up at the sky. 'Cause no one can cry when they're looking at the sky."

Maybe one day, humanity's big selfish dreams will take us back there, and this end of history will release it's vice grip on the world. Maybe we can rediscover what it is to live with a future in front of us. Maybe, instead of staring at the fires around us and crying while we bathe them in more gasoline, we can look to space and see ourselves whole again.

It is a selfish dream, one wracked with the imperfections and fears and oversights common to all of our best and most exciting dreams, but what is more human than that?

[oodlyenough]

I've been pretty critical of AAI so far but I'm mid 1-4 and enjoying the bit I'm playing right now so I feel I should give credit where it's due

Calisto Yew is hilarious

finally... someone willing to laugh in edgeworth's face. lmfao. deserved. sometimes I worry this game has forgotten miles edgeworth is a ridiculous person. calisto yew never has. god bless her

i'm with her, that was hilarious. bully those (post)minors ms yew

This post got really long so here's a cut. More on Yew & Franziska below:

it also meant we got to hear edgeworth and franziska talk about how awful and disgusting defense attorneys are, how could they defend someone who might be GUILTY, the HORROR, because in this universe the actual role of a criminal defense lawyer is arcane knowledge lost to time.

i've found myself wishing AAI got into the defense/prosecution philosophical debate more, the mainline games spend a lot of time positioning the prosecution as the enemy and i thought the alternate perspective here would be compelling. but so far it's mostly been edgeworth "inspecting every nook and cranny" while court has no role to play at all. so this is nice.

2. baby franziska

a lot of why I wanted to play this game at all is because I am obsessed w Franziska and hoped it would continue her story after it kind of unceremoniously ends in AA3. then I ... wasn't thrilled with how she was written in the airline case, so my hopes for baby franziska were not high.

But I'm liking her actually. Her put-on maturity and insane competitive streak really suit a 13 year old, lmao. And I don't have to wonder why she has fire extinguisher amnesia re: everything with her father and DL6. She and Miles are pretty funny, but there's some nice moments too. I really loved this one:

I cut the MVK/Franziska exchange in between for readability, and I'd seen that first screenshot float around plenty before, but I'd never seen the follow up. The progression of MVK is a huge dick to Miles for no reason -> Franziska intervenes in a way that makes MVK change his mind, but, crucially, without revealing any particular sentimentality -> Edgeworth recognizes it for what it is and thanks her anyway -> Franziska brushes it off in a way that lets them go back to competing in lieu of talking about their feelings, phew. Really good and felt very true to the relationship I think these two would have and the ways I think Franziska would demonstrate her care. The rituals are intricate but she loves her idiot little brother.

Also: matching sprites. Hehe.

3. This MVK line specifically, in response to why he wants Edgeworth to be a "top tier prosecutor"

Cracked me the fuck up. What an insane thing to say, and no one in-universe even knows what he's talking about. An inside joke to himself about his 15 year elaborate 5d chess child abuse revenge plan. Nobody's doing it like MVK. His ridiculously circuitous plan is 1/4 complete

Anyway, I'm not done this case yet, but it's the most I've enjoyed AAI so far so I felt I should give it a shout-out, lol. I wish Franziska could be my weird girl all the time 😔

[delicateglitch]

FAV CHAYENZO FIC REC LIST - PART 2

FAV CHAYENZO FIC REC LIST - PART 1

Lemme start by saying that I am a writer in NO ABSOLUTE WAY. I barely read compared to avid book readers. But I LOVE fanfics. I am in no way capable of finding deep literary meaning or write character essays., I read for FFs for fix its, character analysis, to grin over my fav ship being all smushy and to feel an ache for the angst. And yes, the smut. Sometimes, for the tears. I wanna say a BIG THANK YOU to everyone who post their writing for Chayenzo. I fell in love with the show 6 months ago and we've got some WONDERFUL fics on the tag. I hope that as a reader I have done my tiny bit to encourage you. Something about this fics have been a solace to me for the last couple of months and I am genuinely grateful to you for giving me a world to get lost in post the show. I mean no disrespect for the fics I don't post here. These comprise of my most reread and my personal taste. So if you do check this list out - go leave kudos and some nice comments so that we are well fed yeah?

In the Order it was posted : star marked (*) are the ones I have lost count of my rereads.

shades on skin by aellanyx (soulmate retelling - WIP) (can we get an update on this, pretty please?)

room service* by lesserfeelings - Part 2 of 26th of june (post finale - Oneshot) (this sorta hurts but SMUTTY GOODNESS) (lesserfeelings - I see a pattern here)

Wingman* by rosetintednerdglasses (crackfic! - oneshot) (this is hilarious)

Hook Up - ANON (oneshot) (I know youuu)

Picciona Maledetto by Juliette1713 (post finale - oneshot)

after the rain by uvlights (true beauty x Vincezo - multi)

something chemical* by stutteringpeach (FWB - multi)(Damn, this fic is something else!)

Per Te by astormwithskin (alternate meetings - oneshot)

are you going to shoot me?* by rosetintednerdglasses (mafia AU - multi) (I WILL NEVER STOP SCREAMING AND RAVING ABOUT THIS FIC - MY TOP 5; I lost count on my how many times I've reread this)

switchin' the positions for you* by coolbeansbuddyofmine (PWP - Oneshot) (this fic was dedicated for me, I obviously love it)

cramped* by rosetintednerdglasses - Part 4 of il dopo vita / Part 5 of sachets of coffee (oneshot) (my heartttt)

a rush of blood to the head* by stutteringpeach (ABO - oneshot)(Dude, this fic simply blew my mind)

First Time For Everything by Lady_Nerd52 (post finale - multi) (its hot)

how do we fall in love? (baby let's fall in love)* by coolbeansbuddyofmine (text msg AU - oneshot)(this one is adorable!)

in flagranza* by lesserfeelings (interruptions fic! - oneshot) (Phew - this fic!)

this type of love isn't rational, it’s physical (all reason aside, i just can’t deny i love the guy) by coolbeansbuddyofmine (sherlock AU - WIP)

moments together when we fell in love by coolbeansbuddyofmine (sherlock AU - oneshots)

love.* by capriho3 (post finale - oneshot)

of showers and sensibilities* by coolbeansbuddyofmine (post finale - Oneshot)

Like It When You Love Me* by AwakeJuice (post finale - WIP) (Can we get an update, pretty please) (One of the most romantic post finale fics - so beautiful)

too late by meyrmeyr (post finale - WIP) (can we get an update, pretty please) (The ANGST, my heart)

the spell you got on me, it's like magic (got me feeling like falling in love)* by coolbeansbuddyofmine (HP AU - WIP) (MAGIC!)

heat waves by cappers (update - pretty please?) (Archilogical AU - WIP)

give and take* by lesserfeelings (bodygaurd AU - multi)(this fic will transport you)

I’m Always by Your Side* by Ahenix (collection of oneshots) (ANOTHER TOP 5 - you'll go asdfghjkl for almost every chapter) (Sending Ahenix peonis and cannoli for writing almost 120k words)

espresso vs sewage waste by readingnotes (coffeeshop AU - multi)

Sir?* by rosetintednerdglasses (Professor!VC / Lawyer CY - multi)(pleeeeaseee - this fic!!!)

it would've been fun if you would've been the one by augustinecassano (parallel universe - WIP)

Domestic Cencha* by InzaghisGirlfriend (fictober! collection of oneshots // except for the flight attendant AU - so amazing)

the stars, they dazzle* by rosetintednerdglasses (5+1 - AU's - multi)(oh Rose!)

vignettes by stutteringpeach (collections) (please be persuaded to write the chaebol AU)

lesser fragments by lesserfeelings

Some WIP's I'm looking forward to-

Milan by InzaghisGirlfriend

that's the thing about illicit affairs by augustinecassano

street corner dokkaebi by xtreasure17

The Golden Dynasty by yeobeeniejeon

The Word I Can't Say by kaahaani

there is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin by lesserfeelings (NIRE!!!!!)

Hey, I got a new friend! by neighbourhoodbidulgi

Of Thorned Souls and Fading Hearts by Ahenix