#possibly meme worthy

[c-c-v]

Manage to finally make the funi after a lack of motivation and such, humans are still a iffy pain the ass for me so kindly mind any this silly or off, I'm trying real hard here but hopefully ye shall enjoy :3

[aurumacadicus]

Number 11? For the ask meme?

Cleaning up after a wreckage was always an... experience.

Steve hadn't wanted to be bothered now, after the wars, and had chosen the island he lived on because it was impossible to get to except by flight. Even if, by some fluke of fate, a ship managed to avoid Scylla and Charybdis, the water flowed so quickly past his island that no ship could possibly steer toward it in time to land. Not that they could. Charybdis's swallowing and belching sucked under any ships that came close.

The only downside was that pieces of the wreckage settled on his shores, and a mess could grow into something that ships could land at. Crude docks, Bucky had called them once. So he had to travel the shore of the island and pick up pieces wood, bring them together to burn. It wasn't all bad, though. Sometimes casks of wine or baskets of fruit or meat washed up, and he could add it to his makeshift larder.

This ship hadn't had much on it, Steve figured. Probably a skeleton crew, only enough supplies to get to the next port. That wouldn't have been enough to man the ship through the channel. Either they needed enough crew to sacrifice six to Scylla, or enough supplies that the ship would be heavy enough it wouldn't be buffeted about by Charybdis's belching waters. Steve had seen that desperation sink many ships in his time on the island.

So he got the fright of his life as he lifted a scrap of sailcloth and a body moaned beneath it. "Oh fuck," he gasped, dropping the sailcloth.

It collapsed on top of the body again, and the poor thing whimpered. Steve remembered, belatedly, that sailcloth was heavy to normal people. He dropped the lumber he was holding to the side and reached down, hurriedly dragging the cloth up again. He'd only discovered a body once before, because Charybdis's gaping maw usually sucked down everything, and that body had been decidedly dead.

This one, though, he realized, dropping the sailcloth on top of the wood, was only half dead. He stooped to turn him onto his side, wondering if he was dreaming. Scylla and Charybdis had never left a human alive.

Then he saw the glowing blue pendant hanging from a gold chain around the man's neck, and he understood. He recognized the metalwork--Hephaestus's handiwork was unmistakable, especially to him, having wielded a shield the god had gifted to him personally. The gem took him a moment, but then it struck him, the glow coming from deep inside the blue stone. The Titan Theia herself had blessed it, and its gleam came from the man being worthy of carrying it.

To be blessed by a God and a Titan. Steve had never heard of such a thing. He gathered the man into his arms, unable to help his wings extending from his back, feathers glittering silvery-white as he carefully took the man's face in his hand and tipped it toward the sun. Eos might know him. Barring that, perhaps Helios. Worst case scenario, he could show the man's face to Selene. One of Theia's children must know him.

The man's olive skin nearly glowed in the early morning light, and Steve understood why Theia had blessed him. A child of the skies. Hephaestus didn't have much love for humans though. He wondered what the man had done to earn such a boon as the god's handiwork on a piece of jewelry. Perhaps he should go up and ask.

But that was an idea for later. The man needed his immediate attention. "I'm going to take care of you, okay?" he asked gently, brushing the back of his hand over the man's cheek.

The man's pendant grew brighter for a moment, and Steve couldn't help but feel he'd taken on a task set by a god with his question, but somehow, he couldn't bring himself to regret it.

[trashytoastboi]

Day of Envy - Leviathan

~SFW Alphabet~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A = Affection (How affectionate are they? How do they show affection?)

🎮 Levi is affectionate in theory, not in practice. He wants to be affectionate but finds himself to be too nervous, and too insecure to do so. After all, he’s just a gross otaku. How could you possibly want to be touched by him? Takes a lot for Levi to work up the courage and ignore his thoughts of self loathing, having you praise and encourage him works wonders. It makes him really feel he is worthy. Levi still doesn’t think himself deserving, you will have to initiate contact and affection first. All the while hoping that he doesn’t pull away in fear. Levi does really like being held though and he wants to be the little spoon. Not the biggest fan of holding hands only because he needs his hands to play video games. (He’s also worried because he gets sweaty hands) Makes up for it by unconsciously wrapping his tail around you when he’s in demon form. Has a propensity for nuzzling, however one will see a very different side to Levi should any of his brothers be too affectionate with you. His envy will come out in full force and will overcompensate by smothering you in all of his reserved affection that he held back previously.

B = Best Friend (What would they be like as a best friend? How would the friendship start?)

🎮 He is the chaotic friend, one who will constantly spam you with memes, videos and pictures. He also will feed your hyper fixations if it’s something he’s into as well. He’ll check up on you and ask how you’re doing in roundabout ways. If you’re sad he’ll make sure to give you a list of really comforting and uplifting animes as well as surprise you with snacks. He’ll also suggest really wholesome and cozy games. He’s a calming presence to be around even if he’s raging about something, or rambling and going on tangents about his favourite things. He will always listen to you patiently talking about things you like. Most of your activities center around going to conventions, playing games, watching anime, reading manga and light novels or helping Levi with his cosplays. 

C = Cuddles (Do they like to cuddle? How would they cuddle) 

🎮 Doesn’t mind cuddles so long as it doesn’t affect his gaming. He’ll give you some brusque attempt of saying it’s whatever even when his blushing face gives away what he is really thinking. Levi loves cuddles, he’s just too embarrassed to tell you and defaults by putting on the tsundere act to hide the fact that he is nervous. It doesn’t work because it makes him all the more adorable and tempts you to tease him. Sometimes after too much teasing he’ll sulk and go full baby mode, he’s got his arms wrapped around you from behind while you either sit between his legs or on his lap and he’s hiding his face by resting it against your back. 

D = Domestic (Do they want to settle down? How are they at cooking and cleaning?) 

🎮 He’s a pretty fair 6/10, with relatively good capability to clean and cook. (Total malewife material) He just chooses the instant ramen lifestyle, and can easily turn the scores into a 10/10 if he really wanted to. His sewing skills are unrivaled and you’ve never met anyone who can sew like him. Levi has never seen himself with a 3D partner, aka you. So he has settled down a lot before, all in the good ending of his various dating sims. He’s got a hardcore collection of 2D spouses, so he’s willing to settle pretty quickly after every event flag has been triggered. How does this translate into real life you may ask? If you ask him out on a date, it counts as the date event. What about after? When it comes to the dramatic backstory reveal and comfort arc…Or will he receive a sudden proposal from you. Levi will never admit it but he’s waiting. Either for the dialogue option to pop up in his status window or have you trigger the event yourself. 

E = Ending (If they had to break up with their partner, how would they do it?)

🎮 He doesn’t want to face you and does not think he’ll be able to. Levi decides to text you, not great, but how else? It’s that or a handwritten letter. 3 text essays later, one character analysis with a corresponding analogy, details his breakdown and a copious amount of broken heart emojis is more or less what you can expect. He’ll end it with a parting line from one of his go to, give me strength characters. Underneath the self depreciation, comparison back and forth between himself and other characters, you’d eventually find the root of his discontent and the unrest in Levi’s heart. Of course Levi can be a bit… Over dramatic and break up with you over a mistake then apologize and take back everything he said a minute prior. He was just mad because he thought you overwrote his save file. 

F = Fiance(e) (How do they feel about commitment? How quickly would they want to get married.)

🎮 In the real life sense, Levi couldn’t muster an answer to that question. Sometimes he wrangles with the thought of it, wondering if he could actually get married. I mean the absolute potential for a cosplay wedding would be amazing, too amazing to pass up. However, other than that very appealing aspect he just doesn’t know. It’s not that he hates the idea, it was just a possibility he never foresaw himself experiencing. Levi never thought that he would get the chance to love someone as deeply as he loves you, or fall this hard. Especially knowing that you feel the same way about him, it’s enough to bring him to tears. 

G = Gentle (How gentle are they? Both physically and emotionally.)

🎮 Levi is a gentle soul who can sometimes get worked up and over zealous about something. He can get very jealous and lose his gentleness along the way but he’d never really hurt you. It’s more the accident of forgetting to regulate his strength adequately and he might grab your hand a little too hard, not enough to cause injury but the roughness of his action will make Levi feel bad. He’ll feel guilty for days afterwards. Emotionally he’s a squish, you wouldn’t say gentle since he can say some pretty sharp things in defense of what he likes but he’s squishy and easily hurt by words. 

H = Hugs (Do they like hugs? How often do they do it? What are their hugs like?) 

🎮 “I-I don’t like hugs!” Is what he says, not what he actually means. Levi is way too embarrassed about PDA and he’ll combust if he had to hug you in public. He just thinks you’re so perfect and he’s well….him. Levi often hides behind this reasoning to avoid contact in public and social settings. You respect this because you don’t want him to feel pressured or awkward by your sudden affectionate gestures. Even if he’s not honest with his words. His actions will be honest on his behalf and when the two of you are alone he’ll give you lots of affection to make up for what he didn’t do in public. 

I = I love you (How fast do they say the L-Word) 

🎮 Well Levi, our pretty boi who isn’t the most adept at conversation dropped the L-Bomb pretty quickly. Ever since the two of you crossed the threshold of crushes to actually dating, he’s emotional about it and you mean so much to him. So clearly there’s no other right answer aside from LOVE. Levi does ramble a bit, get side tracked and say that he loves his harem too, and all those 2D characters within. He didn’t mean to say that part out loud, he meant to keep it in mind but the funny little thing happened when his brain got all cross wired and you just made him so tongue tied…He should probably stop speaking even though he had already told you all his honest feelings. 

J = Jealousy (How jealous do they get? What do they do when they're jealous?) 

🎮 He isn’t the avatar of Envy for nothing, he lives up to his epithet. It’s a matter of how well he copes with his jealousy and the tendencies that come with it. You didn’t realize it at first until seeing how drastically his personality changes. Levi becomes more domineering, demanding and possessive. You might have mistaken him for the avatar of Greed. You’re his partner, so don’t pay attention to other people. How could you not notice that stupid demon clerk was flirting with you, right in front of Levi. You’re used to a shy and reserved Levi with a reluctance to PDA but when he’s jealous? He’ll have no qualms about pulling you in real close and away from whoever received too much of your attention. It’s for him, don’t go making him jealous. Levi will even ask if you did it on purpose :( “You should know better than to make me jealous…" He’d say in a low voice, uncharacteristic to him. He’ll keep you close and act needy for your attention, so you don’t need to mind other people right? When he’s finally back to his senses he’ll be incredibly embarrassed about whatever he said and did when he was consumed by jealousy. 

K = Kisses (What are their kisses like? Where do they like to kiss you? Where do they like to be kissed?)

🎮 Levi is a real romanticist and enjoys intimate kisses, the kind that make him feel as if his heart is about to beat right out of his chest. So he’ll lighten up and kiss your forehead, your cheek or some sweet gesture of the oh so famous indirect kiss. If the mood is right, he might deliver the smoothest kiss brimming with all his suppressed passion. (Once in a blue moon) His heart is on the verge of bursting if you’re the one who kisses him first, god the way he just melted when you pressed him against the wall and kissed him. He likes when you reach up to give him forehead kisses too, or adorable little nose kisses. 

L = Little Ones (How are they around children?)

🎮 Little ones? Levi would rather not be around them. They stress him out more than he can handle. He’s not good at entertaining them and what constructive conversation could he have with a child? He’s heard about the wisdom that kids possess but when a kid has asked the same question six times, Levi doubts the claim. Did they say they watch anime? Okay maybe it’s doable. He’ll put something on to distract them and throw a snack at their face when he hears the tummy grumble. He does think that’s enough but no one warned him beforehand about a child’s attention span or just how inquisitive they can be. His patience snapped when one of them unboxed a figure to play with it as a toy “I’d teach my kids the value of-” The words added some insight that he has thought about his own little mini me’s before.  

M = Morning (How are mornings spent with them?)

🎮 Mornings can be a bit rough, especially after a binge. He’s only been asleep for half an hour and now he has to get up for class? The audacity of the day… He grumbles, he’s grumpy and he feels tender without adequate amounts of sleep. It wasn’t a good idea to stay up from Friday night through to Monday but he did it and now Levi feels the regret of it. He’s usually good at getting up and surviving on minimal sleep but not when he’s that sleep deprived he’d even convince you to stay with him. Acting all cuddly and pouty so he can turn you into an accomplice, “Lucifer can’t punish both of us” is his sleepy brained logic. 

N = Night (How are nights spent with them?)

🎮 Delicious snacks? Check. Backlog of anime to catch up on? Check. Game to play in the background? Check. Open monitor to peruse potential merch and cosplay specials? Check. Beverages to prevent dehydration? Check! Levi is all ready and set, locked and loaded into his plans for the evening. Which is more or less the same routine and sometimes he’ll spice it up and read manga or a light novel instead of playing a game unless it’s one that can auto farm for him. He’s pretty intense with his rituals and binging. He is impressed by your ability to keep up, truth be told Levi appreciates having someone to talk and rave to about the episode the two of you just watched or when he accidentally does something really cool in game and you were there to witness it. 

O = Open (When would they start revealing things about themselves? Do they say everything all at once or wait a while and reveal things slowly?)

🎮 Levi believes himself to be an open book or so he thinks. He also thinks that making negative jokes about himself is the same as someone getting to know him but Levi is very, very mistaken. Only when he realizes how deeply he can actually trust and rely on you is when he properly opens up his heart. Revealing his insecurities and aspirations, the true nature of things unmarred by anything else. He always worries if you’re going to judge him, he argues with his mind knowing he can trust you. Every secret he’s confided in you has never resurfaced again, he knows. You’re a safe space but it makes him feel exposed and vulnerable and that scares him. 

P = Patience (How easily angered are they?) 

🎮 Can be considered patient in a normal setting. Levi hates confrontation and if anger could lead to that, he would rather avoid it altogether. Levi gets envious, and can lose his temper due to that but without that trigger he’s very much an unloaded gun. However, do something he finds trashy in a video game and watch this man RAGE. You swear he’d put Satan to shame. Perhaps Levi should have been the avatar of wrath. That’s what you think when you see him going off at the troll who just ruined Levi’s vibe with his shit plays and trashy in-game etiquette. (He’s borderline making them regret their own existence) 

Q = Quizzes (How much would they remember about you? Do they remember every little detail you mention in passing or they kind of or forget everything?) 

🎮 He treats you like his favorite series. Levi knows everything about you, even the details you would classify as pointless and maybe even ‘fillers’ to your own lore. Nope he knows it, he’s memorized it. Everything you love, hate or feel lukewarm about. He knows it all. What scares you, what brightens you up and makes you cheer up on a bad day. He knows your favorite characters, the ones you crush over and can’t stand the sight of. You once jokingly asked Levi if he had some folder all about you that he can refer back to, It wasn’t a folder, it was his own personal handwritten MC Lore book that even had illustrated pictures. 

R = Remember (What is their favourite moment in your relationship?)

🎮 Remember that time you got angry and degraded Levi and he– Whoops. Wrong memory. Levi would probably say it was the first time you took him to a proper human world anime convention and even did a couples cosplay with him. He remembers the compliments and how many people wanted to take pictures with the two of you. You guided him through all the various attractions of the human world conventions that he had only ever dreamed about. There were a few things he never knew about, one of the darksides so to say was why the hell is water such a precious resource at a convention? It’s like an SS+ Weapon. 

S = Security (How protective are they? How would they protect you? How would they like to be protected?)

🎮 Levi will protect you even if he’s terrified he’d also be the first person on the front lines to defend you. You can rest assured knowing Levi will always be on your side, if it’s for your sake Levi can even talk back to Lucifer if it’s in your defense. You know just how hard that can be for him, so you appreciate it. You protect Levi in the same ways, some ways you can’t protect him such as hateful comments online and the like as that’s oftentimes out of your control. But you can and will protect him from the insecurity that could bud from those hateful words. Anything you can do, you will. Levi knows that and he feels safe with you because of it. It gives him courage and confidence to see you standing by his side while silently reassuring and supporting him. 

T = Try (How much effort would they put into dates, anniversaries, gifts, everyday tasks?)

🎮 If the consistent density of constant content taught Levi anything, it’s to keep dates, times and schedules highly organized to make sure he tends to everything. Of course Levi uses his great skills in his relationship as well. He makes sure to keep track of all dates of anniversaries, special occasions and more. Levi puts in a lot of effort into your dates and special occasions, it’s a special event after all! He wants to remind you of that. Levi himself will admit that he’s awkward and not exactly the savviest in real world romance but he tries his utmost. 

U = Ugly (What would be some bad habits of theirs?)

🎮 Spontaneously canceling or postponing plans because of a surprise live stream, announcement or unannounced LTE that he absolutely has to tend to. He’ll apologize, and promise to make it up to you. And so he does, it still doesn’t change the fact that you’d be all dressed and ready for a date, waiting for him to arrive only to get a rushed text that says he won’t come. You’ve expressed your annoyance at that before and how it hurts to be stood up, Levi gets that. He really does and he’s sincere in his apology but he also keeps doing it. 

V = Vanity (How concerned are they with their looks?) 

🎮 He is conscious of his looks in a different way to what you’d expect. Levi cares more about what others think about him more than worrying what he thinks about himself. Although when he’s cosplaying he is very attentive and privy to his appearance, everything from his shoes to the makeup and wigs. It’s immaculate. You didn’t realize he’d be that good at it, Levi possessed skills that Asmo was envious over and that stroked Levi’s ego a little. 

W = Whole (Would they feel incomplete without you?)

🎮 He would notice your absence and he’ll feel it deeply. It would suck and Levi would mope or who knows how long. He’d be flooding himself with sad music, sad AMV’s and playing all of his comfort games while reminiscing about you. Which in hindsight would probably make him feel worse. He’d type out long messages, wanting to hit send but change his mind while erasing the entire text. Only then going to mope in his bathtub. (Until one day he accidentally hits send) He’d try to forget you in the process which only makes him feel more regretful that you’re not here. Sometimes you’d only be gone for 30 minutes and it would feel like an eternity. 

X = Xtra (A random headcanon for them)

🎮 Levi had a ritual of kissing his body pillow collection goodnight before tucking them in and saying goodnight to each and every figure he owns. A good otaku must know how to treat their merch right obviously, you’d pout saying you wish you got the same treatment. You had meant it jokingly but ever since then Levi makes sure to always wish you goodnight and give you a little kiss and make sure you’re all tucked in and comfortable in his bathtub while he played games.

Y = Yuck (What are some things they wouldn't like, either in general or in a partner?)

🎮 Himself- I mean…(Moving on) 

🎮 He’s an envious person, so of course his dislike is not what he hates in a person per se but rather a quality that he admires and feel he does not possess in himself. He’d get jealous and hateful because he wishes to possess that trait for himself and not to see it in someone else. More than anything Levi gets annoyed by his own envy more often than not. It’s inconvenient to be having a good day, see something and then have his mind riddled with jealous thoughts. 

Z = Zzz (What is a sleep habit of theirs?) 

🎮 Well when he actually does decide to sleep, he loves it being comfy. He curls up likes a kitten and snuggles his own tail and a body pillow (or you if you’re sleeping over in his room for the night) Has a tendency to sleep talk and whine in his sleep. Letting out the cutest sounds you’ve ever heard. When you tell him about it, he’d go so far to deny it and say that you were just imagining things. Recording him didn’t help because he nearly smashed your D.D.D to hide the evidence. 

Taglist: @completelyshatteredbrokenmschf

[cerastes]

How to use ray?

You can either use her as a straight line lane cover like Ifrit due to her range but that's usually not using her to her max potential. You want to cover some terrain with her range, but not as much as you can usually, because the thing is, you want her to shoot enemies that deserve it.

Ray deals monstrous amounts of damage but it's limited by her ammo mechanic. If she's shooting at everything all the time, she's going to basically attack at half speed, since she has to reload and then fire, given she'll never have time to reload. She's good for finishing off medium targets (weak targets ideally never reach her range) and engaging with heavy/key targets.

All of her skills are good, she's a pretty worthy M9. Check the numbers yourself, as usual, no sense in inflating the word count on this post by describing what you can already read elsewhere.

S1 is your Spinach skill, and it lets you have a more consistent economy of action with Ray due to it being able to store charges, likely killing whatever it hits due to its massive multipliers, and also giving extra bullets on her next reload whenever she kills something with it. The push can also be useful for either Shift Memes, or simply to push back a fool.

S2 is her Sandbeast centric skill. It gives her a bit more range directly to her sides, which is very very important because those are new tiles in which you can position your Sandbeast and thus give her REALLY goofy expanded range to perform some ridiculous shooting with her. Remember that her Sandbeast is an extension to her range AND she will prioritize shooting things in the Sandbeast's range, who will also take extra damage. She gets all ammo spent in Sandbeast range back once the beast retreats, so make sure to use the beast as much as possible, and manually retreat it for even more uptime.

S3 is her breadwinner: She gets increased reload speed (a stat distinct from ASPD), reloads to full, and then unleashes real cannonballs at anything she shoots. This is your boss killer, your elite killer, even your laneclear if you want to use it like that... And you want to! If she kills something, she gets a huge SP refund, making this a good cycling skill that isn't JUST a boss killing tool. Anything that gets shot is afflicted with Bind for a few seconds, and she can permaBind something for the duration of her skill assuming she can keep targeting it. Having such good CC for a skill that deals so, so much damage is very rare, and remember, the more she shoots the same target, the more DEF she ignores. Set things up so she can absolutely ruin one enemy's life instead of alternating targets (target gets bound, another walks past, now Ray will shoot that target), and Sandbeast whenever you can alongside this skill.

DO NOT be conservative with the Sandbeast, use it as much as possible, and use her not as your first line of damage, but rather, as the line of damage that kills whatever gets past your initial damage line to use her at her max potential.

[imustbenuts]

reading trigun in japanese - baseball and nuclear warheads thoughts

gonna tag these post as #trigunbookclub so for my mutuals and followers who arent into this feel free to mute as you will... let me lose my mind for a while the horrors are getting to me ;;

disclaimer: all translations i give in my posts will be mine and in a more unrefined, raw form. this is for 'triangulation' reading purposes, nothing else.

anyway, i think meryl and nightow both have a fascination with baseball. theres this line where meryl says in JP thats really caught my attention for reasons in this post.

"It's like letting children play a game of baseball with nuclear warheads. Mess up and the whole town gets wiped out!"

fascinating. this implies meryl has experience with baseball herself, but i wonder how thats played in NML? considering theres sand everywhere. maybe old baseball videos are a thing? they archived those?

and also this scene from stampede. did it come from this panel?

to yap: i know baseball in japan was a HUGE thing back around 1990s to 2010s. what with the sport being on national tv, and 2 big baseball related meme worthy news hit the japanese public consciousness that i know of: The Hanshin Tigers' Colonel Sanders Curse In The Dotonbori River Canal, and Ichiro Suzuki's Famous Laser Beam... but the guy debuted in Japan in 1992. very fun stuff to read up on.

also, i believe trigun came after a time where 2 bad stuff were happening in japan. these are the hanshin earthquake and the tokyo sarin gas attack, both in 1995, so the mention of a nuclear warhead here is... something... possibly speaking about some kind of cultural trauma. (not to mention the 90s bubble burst but im getting lost in the sauce)

[another-lost-mc]

the fucking crow with the knife 💀💀💀

now pushing my unhinged crow karasu agenda where silly pookie wookie bear is doing the most outta pocket meme worthy shit because no one except mc knows he turned into a crow

LET HIM BE A SILLY GOOSE

-🪶

the adventures of crowasu

sfw | crack | let the little crow boi live

He’s going to avoid flying as much as possible because that’s boring—he can fly in his demon form.

He definitely wants you to carry him around instead. He’s going to be perched on your shoulder if you can’t carry him.

If your shirt or sweater is loose enough, he might just try to crawl inside and poke his head out from your neckline once in a while.

He wants ALL THE CUDDLES! Rub his little head and coo about how adorable and smart he is, and he’s going to do a little happy crow dance and make the cutest noises.

He helps you with your school work by tapping his beak against your books to point out where the answers are.

He tries to use your computer, but he squawks angrily when typing on the keyboard is too cumbersome.

He tries to use your D.D.D. too and pecks a dent in the case by accident when his beak slides against the screen.

There is going to be a crow suddenly following you around RAD. If he gets caught/sent outside, he’s going to perch on the window sill or rafter outside your classroom while he waits.

He might drop some unpleasant accidents on students that he thinks are talking badly about you, or trying to flirt with you, or stand too close to you…

If they don’t get the hint, he’s going to start pecking at their eyes next.

He brings you little surprises: your favourite snack or candy, a cute novelty pen, even a soft devil silk scarf. You have no idea where he got them though.

(He keeps track of the things he borrows from other students and Asmo and even the stores he flies into when you’re not looking. He’ll pay for them after he’s back to normal.)

Most of the demons catch on that it’s him and plan to tease him about it later. Asmo loves it—he has some cute videos and photos of him (and both of you together) on his Devilgram now.

Mammon keeps an eye on him and reminds Beel that crows are friends, not food.

Solomon doesn’t realize (or doesn’t care) that his horrible cooking was the cause of this whole mess, even though Crowasu won’t stop trying to attack him whenever he’s nearby.

Later when he’s back to normal, Karasu pretends it was the worst day of his life and vows to never let Solomon forget it.

(He changes the wallpaper of his D.D.D. to a photo of him as a crow snuggling in your arms.)

(You collect all his loose feathers you find later and put them in a shadow box with photos from that day as a gift.)

[caw4brandon]

The Power of Stop-Motion

Media in today's standard is quick and easy. Rarely is a show more than 2 hours long or 13-epiodes per-season. With that, animated movies are a lot slower than the typical films.

There is a discussion on if animation is suitable for film purposes and while it is often shunned by the Golden Globes or the Oscars or other awards. The very few outliers can prove these awards and the world very wrong.

But that is not what we will be talking about today. Because while animation is popular, there is a dark horse among its sphere. One with a rich history and strong filmography that should be shared. Let's talk about;

- Have I possibly gone daffy? -

Stop-motion is a film making style that compiles multiple still images of an object being physically manipulated in small movements into one whole scene.

Majority of Stop-motion films and videos use [Clay Animation] or [Paper Animation] with several more varieties of new innovations emerging under the umbrella of stop-motion. The most popular of them in the modern era towards kids is [Lego animation] which is the manipulation of Lego models in motion.

The earliest trace of Stop-motion in films is the 1898 short [The Humpty Dumpty Circus] by Albert E. Smith and James Stuart Blackton which is said to be a lost media. To compensate, please watch [A Tribute to Stop Motion]

In its early concept, Stop-motion was used as a method to create impossible things or do practical effects under budget constrains. Such as the iconic King Kong scene at the Empire State building. Since then, Stop-motion has evolved into a full production industry. From Indies; [Righteous Robot] to Juggernauts; [Laika Studios]

- Shimmer a Little at The Edges -

Unconventional media such as stop-motion is often not a style suited for every story. Its a rather expensive type of media that requires worthy innovations top break the niche barrier. Just looking at Laika Studios alone, we see that they've develop a lot of interesting ways to improve visual effects while staying to their stop-motion roots.

One perfect example is seen in < Kubo and the Two Strings > where the animators need to create water in a still image world that feels natural. [A Perfect Storm] one other part of the stop-motion puzzle is the iron-willed discipline it to conceptualize, animate and edit a production that can take about 3 to 5 years to complete. More so of a time frame than a normal film.

This difficult curve lead to budgeted methods such as using models that already exist to tell new stories. Such as; Legos or with crude multi-jointed figures of existing characters. [MOONSHINE]

While I may say its crude, the low budget production is the selling point. Assisted with sound bites taken from gaming sessions or from shows featuring a lot of inside jokes and memes. Also, its hilarious to see a Teletubby turned into a Eldritch monster.

These attempts to make stop-motion productions accessible has captured the attention of other like-minded channels to collaborate and elevate one another. [ERB: Harry Potter vs Luke Skywalker]

- For Better Tomorrows -

With all that is said, what is the power of stop-motion? As a media that is tediously overlapping across processes. What are the better tomorrows for our inanimate subjects?

I like to think, that as filmmaking grows. Stop-motion will continue to remain as a sacred tug against live action films and traditional animation. It can be used to tell complicated stories with concepts that may look strange if its adapted in a live action.

As I have mentioned in [The Beautiful World of Hilda] animation's greatest strength is simplification. Stop-motion takes the opposite side of that philosophy.

Its a higher level of world building of the materials with willingness to accept mistakes and ruggedness that gives them that little flavor of life. As an actual touchable thing, the various cartoonish styles can take on a whole new dimension to heighten the style and give it that detail that is less polished.

Stop-motion shows that filmmaking magic can still exist despite already knowing the tricks. Its a media where every frame shown has a significant purpose that invokes a specific flow. That's the power of stop-motion.

[nightcolorz]

I do like ghost lestat hes funny as shit, but I also think it’s dumb as hell how they translated the aspect of the book where Louis is so used to lestat as a routine domestic part of his life that after he dies he often feels him there in places where he isn't because of how much he longs for him and made it lestat is a silly ghost. louis mistakenly imaging the feel of Lestat’s breath on his neck when he wakes up in his coffin only to roll over and find the space next to him cold and barren, the familiar routine echo of Lestat humming to himself as he returns home from a hunt that Louis swears for a moment he hears while he’s sitting cross legged with a book in his lap that fades into nothingness when he remembers that he threw lestats body in a swamp and watched him burn into nothingness before his eyes, the ghost of a touch on his shoulder, the devilish smile in the corner of his eye, and amc took that and made it “Louis is hashtag crazy and he is constantly literally accompanied by a fully formed hallucination of lestat that bitches comedically while Louis makes out with Armand and eats paper and smokes passively aggressively in the background”. Like ok wow way to stomp on all the subtlety and annihilate the pervasive sense of grief and loneliness there 😭😭. Why does amc iwtv have such a habit of taking subtle, quiet and thoughtful parts of the books and making them as extreme and overblown and ridiculous as possible. God forbid a tv show not be constantly exciting and intense or meme worthy for a moment ig 😭 modern viewers don’t want things to be quiet or slow paced, totally. And the thing is I don’t even rlly mind representing this grief visibility by a “ghost” of lestat being present, but the implication that he is a literal hallucination that Louis often interacts with is so stupid imo like they should have just made it a metaphor or smth cuz dude

[askzloyxp]

i'm 55 minutes into your mega-episode and i remembered how cool your timelapse music is. sooo could you drop a playlist pretty-pretty-pretty please? not even just TB6, i am humbly asking for a Sloy music-dump. please🥺?

Okay, let's rock out! Here's a wastly incomplete list of stuff I recently used in videos, with a playlist I should keep updating later for your convenience

Pluffaduff - Ain't Nothing Like A Funky Meme (used a the Let The Bodies Hit The Floor bit from here in the TB6-0) Shaxicula by DjCummerbund- This is where the "Dig through the ditches" joke came from, not the original Dragula XD Bendy And The Ink Machine Instrumental by The Living Tombstone - It pains me whenever I use this tune, but it's possibly the best intro song I have! We Are Number One But It's Electro Swing Remix by The Musical Ghost - Kinda same, but it's absolutely my favorite gag. Served me well through the Create series, cause Electroswing is real steam-punky feeling Show Your Style by Miracle Of Sound - Mostly is here as a reminder of the fact that all Miracle Of Sound music is safe to use in streams and stuff. They're just really cool like that Papercut Machete by Pluffaduff - Honorary mention, it's just a really cool sounding mash up I'm listening to right now. Can't use this one in a video but daang

Punch Deck - The Sound Consumes - Very groovy, love this one Punch Deck - Can't Stop - Epic, Rocking, if you want AMV music? this is it! Punch Deck - Fluid Dynamics - Pretty sure this is a Use With Attribution, but I had it flag on my vids a few times?? Must've been me messing up and not crediting right. Either how, a banger. Punch Deck - Night Shift - Nice melancholic melody, very lovely

Minerva - Colors - I really enjoy editing ANYTHING to this song! Wontolla - Holo (Ampyx Remix) - Unofficial theme of Truly Bedrock Season One. Apyx Holo and its remixes served me super good in that time. But this one is by far the best version of that song! Wontolla - Lighter Than Air - One day I will create a build timelapse worthy of this song, until then, I will keep trying DOCTOR VOX - Paranoid Empire - massive and evil sounding tune. Great for timelapses of anything with skulls on it, really No Escape (Ft. @T_en_M and @LaudividniYT) - bouncy and Minecrafty sounding music meant as a fan-made music disk Digital Math - The Musky Thrust - fun and pranky music I keep reusing whenever things go completely off the rocker More to come some time in the reblogs, and thank you for trusting my taste in music! And remember: if all else fails, simply listen to Linkin Park Hybrid Theory on repeat for 10 to 15 years!

[c-c-v]

Hair of Flames style unlocked :3

(I dunno if anything like dis was made before but if there is I apologize in advance)

[mikeellee]

Hi, in the lieu of the lastest chapter of MHA I want to do a post bc ...I almost fall on the mistake to respond the izu hate vitrol

To all the stans of shig and LoV, please, if you have to hate a person for what befall on Shig ...hate Afo or hori (NO DEATH THREATS! HE IS NOT IMMUNE TO CRITICISM BUT HATE AND CRITICISM ARENT THE SAME) but not Izu!

Take a wild guess who is blamed for all Shig did? Izuku Midoriya ofc.

And is bizarre how you lot are ready to jump on the Izu hate when he is, canonically, the only one who wanted to save shig...who btw doesn't deserve an ounce of consideration from Izu. Shig is undeveloped (to be fair, Izu is too. But if you guys call him deku knowing it means useless, then please let's all call Shig the dark deku bc he is a broken doll who can only destroy)

Shiga has show, canonically, he doesn't value any life. He is a terrible leader, he is immature and knew afo was manipulating him and went along (guys all I cited here is pure canon)

I talked to @bibibbon about this and like what would even be Shig's plan here? He knew afo was manipulating him....so he was waiting for an opening ....in the worst time possible?

This legit makes me think of Aizen and Ichimaru from Bleach. To summarize: Ichimaru decided to betray Aizen ....when Aizen was in god form. Poor choice, poor plan indeed

(was Hori copying Tite Kubo? Maybe?)

Also...Shig is hella inconsistent. He hates am bc........

I don't know. He just does.

"Afo groomed him"

Yes and no. Grooming would imply he spend time with shig, and what is showed is how...afo tossed shig aside, communication happened, ofc, but it was via phone or cameras....why?

Actually why afo even has shig as "heir"? The plan since day 1 was to take shig's sexy body? Ok then why toss him aside.

I don't think Afo groomed shig, per se, it was more coaxing him to the worst conclusion....and shig says yes.

At the end of the day, while we can blame afo ... shig's actions are his.

Now onto Izu. Izu who values himself so little ...he went to save Shig bc anyone is worthy saving but him ...and you lot think this is normal or smth to mock Izu. Izu lost his quirk and arms (yes, he got it back) to save a man ...he barely knows. Everyone wanted to kill him and they are right. Gran Torino is right here and yet...Izu tried....but Shig failed himself.

"I'm destruction" He says.

Izu tried to save a monster.

And the monster choose death.

The only plotline Hori gave to Izu ....and he failed. Please be mad at the author for his abysmal incompetency here. The moment shig accepted afo he was extra doomed.

Abd even if in the next chapter Shig is brought back....what good this will give? He will rot in prison.

"this is Izu's fault" no. He is so innocent here it's ridiculous.

(wanted to post here the "how many times do we have to teach this lesson old man" from Bob sponge bc is a meme that fits Izu perfectly )

Shiga is the one to fail himself.

Shiga is TENKO...but he is not that cute kid anymore.

And "change society" no one in class A1 or Izu had the mind to make commentary about society bc well...society would stop existing thanks to Shig and LoV.

Do I need to say again? Izu is innocent here.

"he looks cold at shig" my guy, they are strangers...not long lost brothers (or lovers but we have fics for that) they are strangers and ...considering all unnecessary shit shig did...izu was being way kinder.

[spop-romanticizes-abuse]

I guess they thing that annoys me when it comes to She-Ra couples is not exaclty that it have too many couples but that they don't really make sense most of the time.

A lot of shows have a lot of canon couples, but most of the time they make sense and have some sorta of build up and development. Like in Harry Potter, it makes sense Hermione geting together with Roney, in Demons Slayer it makes sense Nezuko getting with Zenitsu, those are couples who are build to be together (honestly in the movies especifically Hermione and Rony are like, the only couple that had development).

But in She-Ra is like they make those couples so that some character don't end up single, like why does Lonnie have to be in a polycule with Rogelio and Kyle even tho she never showed interest in any of them? Why is Mermista and Sea Hawk a thing even tho Sea Hawk is a freaking annoying pyromaniac? Why Bow and Glimmer are a thing even tho they never had any chemistry and are so freaking boring together?

This is some Chris Chan levels of writing, every character have to be together regardless of whatever sense that makes (if you don't know who he is, basically he made the Sonichu meme and every character on the comic got together because he wanted a girlfriend). Is like in Boruto where all the cast started to date each other and most of them didn't make any sense

yeah, for a show that's about queer representation, they sure left out ace and aro representation. and even allo people sometimes choose to stay single. not everyone NEEDS a romantic partner.

in the end, spop really didn't do anything too progressive because they still valued amatonormativity over good character arcs. most of the platonic relationships were pushed aside for the sake of romance, and people who showed absolutely no romantic interest toward each other were suddenly in love (*cough* glimbow and scorfuma *cough*).

and the BFS suddenly included catra, just because she was now adora's girlfriend. all these allies and people who genuinely cared about adora, glimmer and bow, and yet the only person worthy of being in their friend group is the war criminal who tortured them for fun.

and it really sucks that the one of the very few canon queer polycules we have in media is.. a neurodivergent-coded queer kid, and his bullies. if they really wanted a good polycule, they could have gone with the BFS. but a lot of these were just for brownie points imo. they didn't really care about GOOD representation, they just wanted to cram in as much representation as possible.

[willowbee-brook]

As I recover from a glorious season 2 finale that I thoroughly enjoyed, I just want to applaud the Daemon character arc. I know the Harrenhal Mystery Gang memes were stretched a little thin, but talk about fucking redemption on a personal scale. The sacrifice of pride in oneself for the preservation of the future. Understanding your place in The Big Fucking Picture and finally earning the legacy that your brother always wanting you to be worthy of.

As boring as watching Daemon's haunted ass walk around a derelict castle, high on witch shrooms, you know you caught your breath when he was ready to hear the Song of Ice and Fire, find the strength to bend the knee to his wife and Queen, AND (audible gasp) do it in the sexiest way possible that only Daemon Targaryan was capable of.

Great writing 10/10 I want more men who will go batshit crazy on his wife's enemies so they can ensure the survival of future generations from Supernatural Evil. Together. Daemon finally Gets It.

[therentyoupay]

Jelsa + office/workplace AU for 3 sentence fic please?

♡ image ♡♡ askbox meme ♡♡♡ on ao3 (uninvited)

The early morning fog made Elsa's corner office feel oddly reminiscent of just last week when she'd sat atop the Austrian Alps, sipping fresh dark coffee from her balcony, wondering if Anna truly needed her back in the office by Monday... and knowing all the while that she'd be back, according to schedule, no matter what.

You have no choice.

She stamped down the tiny whisperings of resentment and bitterness and curiosity, and you don't want to be here, you've never wanted to be here, as she meticulously arranged her notes for the morning meeting. Elsa cleared her mind as she sat in her cold, crisp office on the 118th floor, sipping homemade decaf coffee from her familiar thermos, unable to keep from wondering what the look on Anna's face might be, if she—in all her leadership, all her efficiency, all her planning and honesty and meticulous preparations—ever actually found the nerve to step down, step back, step away, and let Anna rise up in her stead, to take control of the company that Elsa had always been too efficient not to lead but had never truly wanted.

"Oh," a voice cut through Elsa's useless daydreaming so quickly she actually started—and was therefore all the more annoyed for it when she saw a young man—James? John? Jacob? she should really know Anna's new temp by now, but she was slipping so quickly, so distracted these days—"My bad, I thought you'd probably want one but it looks like you already got yours."

Elsa glanced to his arms—full of three carriers, honestly, who had sent him out for so many coffees at once, and who did she need to have a word with about the way this company treated their temporary staff?—and then her gaze landed on the compostable to-go cup of black iced coffee labeled decaf and, to her mild horror and amusement, scary boss.

"Uh," he—Jason? Jameson?—was blushing, when he, too, saw the label. Good, she thought, ruthlessly. "Um. They weren't supposed to write that down."

Elsa raised a single brow.

"But!" he was grinning, clearly caught out and not anxious about it in the slightest, and suddenly Elsa had many questions about Anna's newest addition to her staff. (Elsa deliberated—cold and stern? gracious and merciful?—and settled for something in between.) He was starting to back away, anyhow, toward the door, "I didn't realize you bring your coffee from home, and you already have one, so, I won't bother you—"

"If not to me, then to whom might you deliver it?" He froze. She held her thermos aloft, looking him carefully in the eye, so that he could see the gentle curve of her smirk—she saw the edge of tension in his shoulders lessen, watched the glow of his face in early morning skyscraper fog slide into something easier, something more playful.

Interesting.

Disrespect? No, she would have smelled that a mile away.

Unprofessional? A little, certainly, but Elsa—look at what you're doing this very moment?

She watched his eyes flip through possible answers like a gameshow contestant, and he tentatively offered, "... Anna?"

Elsa grinned in spite of herself, at the clear lie within; Anna had many worthy leadership qualities, but she'd always been more approachable than Elsa, no matter the day. Intimidating? When Anna wanted to be, sure. Scary? Hardly.

"A worthy answer," she praised, which had the most interesting result of him lighting up—and blushing again. He was clearly harmless.

Oh, what the hell.

Elsa carefully moved a stack of paperwork—crisp, tidy, ready to be ignored for review—to the side, and pulled a second coaster from its stack, then gently laid the coaster on the corner of her desk. And waited.

"Oh. You don't have to—I mean—"

"Jack," she commanded, as his name flooded back to her in a sudden sweep of memory; Anna had mentioned something about being very excited to hire him on for the next month or two, something about helping a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend who was down on his luck. "Leave the coffee."

He grinned, clearly pleased with himself. Perhaps a bit too pleased with himself... She stamped down the sudden self-doubt and alarm; it was good for employee morale to keep spirits high and to show some of her humanity whenever she could—snow queen, ice queen, they whispered, when they were too careless to recognize that she had eyes and ears everywhere in this kingdom of hers—but this. Was this too much? What have I done?

He did not immediately provide any relief on that front as he walked up to her desk with a truly shit-eating grin that was already grating along her spine. He carefully balanced all three carriers and delivered her iced coffee to her coaster with an alarmingly apt degree of coordination. Elsa blinked.

"Black, decaf, light ice," he grinned, righting himself and his coffee carriers. "What should I ask them to write on your cup, next time?"

My name? she thought dryly, then paused. For reasons she could not quite pin down, she gave him a level stare and said, "Surprise me."

She'd assumed he couldn't light up any further, but clearly, she was wrong.

With an aye, aye, madam! and an exaggeratedly playful wink—which completely caught her off-guard—he easily and gracefully backed out of the ajar door to her office, which he gently nudged open with his foot—his foot!! like it were a barn door or something!—with 11 more cups of coffee deftly balanced in his capable hands, and was gone.

Elsa suddenly eyed the drink on her desk with a mixture of shock, alarm, and curiosity, knowing deep in her bones that her well-established routine was thoroughly and utterly disrupted. She reminded herself again that he would be gone in only a matter of weeks, anyway; Elsa remembered something now from Anna about how Jack was moving between jobs, between states, floating from place to place, so all of this would be over before it started—before what started, Elsa?! So, really, there was no cause for alarm.

Elsa sipped her unnecessary, uninvited, decaf, black, light-ice, iced coffee, and gazed into the morning New York City fog, and wondered.

[best-underrated-anime]

Best Underrated Anime Group J Round 1: #J4 vs #J5

#J4: Kids conquering dungeons to change the world

A Magi is a magician whose inclination toward magic is so immense that they can be said to shape the world. With their significant influence, each Magi chooses a worthy candidate to become a king, then helps them conquer strange labyrinths called "Dungeons" and acquire the power of mythical djinns within. Above all else, the Magi supervises their elected representative as they build a country that might one day bring the world to its knees.

Aladdin is a young Magi wandering the world in search of his true self. However, his journey is not a lonely one, as he is accompanied by his friend and mentor Ugo—a djinn he summons using his flute. On his travels, Aladdin also befriends Alibaba Saluja and guides him to a nearby Dungeon. With this newfound friendship, they begin an epic adventure across the world, witnessing various irregularities that seem more frequent than ever.

#J5: Girls live in a school, but not by choice

Carefree high school senior Yuki Takeya looks forward to the School Living Club every day. Consisting of the president Yuuri Wakasa, the athletic Kurumi Ebisuzawa, the mature Miki Naoki, the supervising teacher Megumi Sakura, and club dog Taroumaru, the club prides itself on making the most of life at school. There is only one rule the club members have to follow: all members must live their entire lives within school grounds.

[Admin: I didn’t notice it while screening the submissions, but the submitter’s original trailer and tagline contained MAJOR spoilers for episode 1. Luckily, I’ve watched this show before, so I can edit it safely.]

Titles, propagandas, trailers, and poll under the cut!

#J4: Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic

Propaganda 1:

Imagine characters from Arabian Nights/1001 Nights coming to life in an anime. Even though it is loosely inspired off of the tales, it is a unique time and place from most anime settings. It has action, humor, and deep concepts. One of my favorite parts about Magi is how well-developed the background characters are.

Propaganda 2:

This anime has a lot of philosophical takes on what fate is. Basically, is everything that happened to you caused by a force you can’t control or is it what you make of it? Is there something or rather someone pulling the strings on what should or shouldn’t be? Is the person you are because you were lucky or unlucky to be born in the wealthy family or not? Why are things the way they are? Why was I dealt with a shitty hand in life? Is it because I’ll never amount to anything, or is something doing this to me? Why are we here just to suffer kind of deal, but you know not the meme version, the really sad and real version. Then you have the side of the people who may have not had the best life, but found a way out of it. Why do some people get to feel the light when you went through the same thing, but still lost and in the dark?

Trigger Warnings: Partial nudity and slavery. One of the mains is a slave in the beginning, but the other two mains help free her from that.

#J5: School-Live! (Gakkougurashi!)

[Admin: The official trailer spoils ep1, so here, have the opening instead.]

Propaganda:

If you like Madoka Magica, you’ll 100% like this series. It’s hard to explain without spoilers, but it has a huge plot twist in the first episode. The anime is a short one with only 12 episodes, but it has an amazing manga as well! It mixes a cute slice of life high school anime with a darker plot, and it’s handled so well. It doesn’t seem like it’s just dark for the sake of being edgy like some other similar series. It covers topics like mental health and grief well, and it has as happy of an ending as possible for a series like this. The plot twists were executed so well, and I was sobbing by the end of the series.

Trigger Warnings: Animal Cruelty or Death, Graphic Depictions of Cruelty/Violence/Gore, Derealization.

[Admin: I had to remove the submitter’s explanations for the TWs because it will spoil the show greatly. You're on your own now. Proceed at your own risk.]

If you’re reblogging and adding your own propaganda, please tag me @best-underrated-anime so that I’ll be sure to see it.

[prof-ramses]

Decided to rant about Striker's character and why I think he works (Warning: This ended up being massive)

The best analogy about Striker that I can make is that he isn't really a cowboy, but a comic book villain who themes himself around being a cowboy. Now that I've done the meme-y version, allow me to actually explain.

A lot of people seem to overlook that there is a single thread that holds together Striker's personality, and is the root of most of his characterization. And that thread is a need for respect.

Let's look through his appearances and explore how his obsession manifests:

Harvest Moon Festival:

In his first episode, Striker presents himself as a model Wrath imp in order to gain the trust of Millie's family and Blitz. The only person he breaks character around is Moxxie, since he assumes Moxxie's insecurity about not being good enough in the eyes of his in-laws will make him automatically respect someone who they do approve of.

He later breaks character when Blitz catches him, he tries to convince Blitz that they're too good to live their lives around the whims of nobles, he tries to show himself as someone who can get Blitz what he wants, or rather, what Striker thinks Blitz wants, again to seem like someone who's "got it figured out" .

Another note worthy thing is his very professional way of speaking with Stella in both this and the next episode he's in, we'll get back to this later.

Western Energy:

The first point of interest is easy to miss the significance of, when breaking into the Richest Cup he makes it as dramatic as possible, he's trying to show himself as dangerous enough to warrant such cocky recklessness while surrounded by goetic demons.

After he takes Stolas we see his hideout which is full of scavenged western imagery that looks like an ominous lair, but upon closer inspection is actually a meager living arrangement for a deeply troubled demon.

His actual rant to Stolas includes a line about nobles taking everything lower class demons care about, showing WHY respect is important to him, he's never felt that he, or the part of society he belongs to, have been respected, or as he later says, all nobles do is try to talk over them.

Striker torturing Stolas shows how his need for respect is reflected in him being an assassin, he thinks he can get respect through fear, that having the most primal form of authority over someone will make him feel more significant. And this is why Stolas and I.M.P. are his greatest enemies, their irreverence makes them the only targets that don't play his game, that remind him of what he really is, a desperate, fragile, hero in his own mind, willing to do whatever it takes to prove his importance, not to others, but to himself.

Once again, he's begrudgingly cordial towards Stella despite his hatred of royals, in an effort to get even a fleeting acknowledgement of his worth. Showing that his belief that he can play into people's minds to get what he wants extends to his emotional wants as well.

Oops:

Here we see Striker in a much different light, mostly due to his new employer. First off, he's much more open with his frustration and moments of weakness, despite Crimson actually being physically present there and being able to see and hear everything. I think this is because Crim is a rare example of someone Striker doesn't feel he needs respect from. Crimson is, at least in Striker's eyes, an imp who has found moderate success by mimicking the lifestyle of a royal. He might not show it, but Striker probably resents Crimson just as much as, if not more than, he resents Blitz and Fizz, since Crimson has no actual royal support (that we know of).

Speaking of Blitz and Fizz, in his interaction with them in the cage scene we get the most blatant example of Striker thinking that his victimhood as an imp makes his "accomplishments" more worthy of respect, as he completely skirts around the fact he's the only hybrid out of the three, and we also learn he's aware of all this on at least some level when he threatens Fizzarolli for comparing him to a royal due to his arrogance.

And lastly, the climax when he grabs Fizz and the moment when we get the immortal line "Why is it always a sex thing!?", and why is it always a sex thing? Why do the members of IMP and those close to them not fall for his act? Put simply, it's due to trust, no matter how skilled or intimidating he is, Striker is still a loner with no one and nothing to fall back on beside his own skill. In sharp contrast to this the main cast have strong enough bonds that they know someone will oppose him. For example, Striker's attempt at demoralizing Stolas fails because he didn't think Blitz would trust his employees enough to do the saving.

So, yeah, I think Striker currently has a better thematic through line than any other villain in the series and I'm interested in seeing where they take him next. That being said, I feel Crim could be just as great and will probably make a similar post for him after his third episode.