#pulling something together while i try to formulate thoughts on themes cat And Others. if i ever formulate thoughts. you know how it is

[bates--boy]

The summoning site was in order, replicating everything like the first time, from the (now-stained) tin bowl sitting in its trivet above the candle, to the instructions he had written placed next to him for reference, to the camera rolling in front of him for more documentation to look through -- though, this wasn’t about research.

And because of that, Peter went to his bedroom, crouching in the closet to push aside everything until he found what he needed, tucked away in the dark corner. As the curious, syrupy pillars of light stood behind him and watched over his shoulder, Peter picked up one of the bundles of black velvet and untied its corners.

The gaping twin cavities bore into him as soon as the fabric fell away, its soulless and empty stare still somehow mocking him, made worse by the lipless smirk of its crooked and chipped teeth. Whoever this person was, they did not practice proper dental hygiene. Peter bounced the skull to feel the weight with his palm, more an absentminded tic than anything, as his thoughts raced with the half-formulated plan and doubts that it would even work. But he had to trust it, and he had to make this trip count: he had only three of these skulls, and his old medical research buddy had already asked a lit of questions during the first request.

Next, he went to his bedside table, holding the skull in the fold of his arm as he would a soccer ball. Peter yanked it open and reached inside to unfold the satin wrap. There, lying on its side, glinting in the morning light fighting its way through the blackout curtains Peter had drawn together to curb any source of heat, was the S.A.C.M. 1935A. Hers; he still remembered the weight of it in his tiny hands when she shoved it to him, and the instructions -- shoot any kraut bastard that gets near you -- she whispered to him when she forced him into a closet to hide. It had since been plated a rose gold like the slender crucifix that dangled from her neck, the cracks and chips in the wooden handle filled and the thing coated over with a white and gold marble paint. The bullets were hidden away, and the only use the gun had was to be polished on the occasions Peter felt truly nostalgic.

He carried both back to the kitchen table, sitting the skull in the bowl and the pistol directly in front of him. He lit the candle underneath the bowl and, unwrapping the bandage from one of his hands, wrung and tensed up his palms until the blood he needed trickled into the empty sockets. His vision began to warp, twisting at the outer edges. The souls that had gathered in his house turned to him, he could sense their stares, but none seemed important, when underneath his nose, the gun started to emit a glow, faint, a little weak after nearly eighty years, but showing that it was indeed her leftover energy.

His body locked up, anticipating the dragging and flying between planes like last time. The souls that inhabited his flat screamed, converging, reaching for him to pull him away and hold him down.

Peter took a dry, ragged breath.

And he was in. No dramatics, no tricks, no flashing horrors that rivaled psychedelic drugs or religious-themed nightmares instilled in him by having religion literally beat into him throughout his tender ages. It was similar to walking into the next room, albeit one that sucked the air out of him and left his insides feeling cold while his skin still burned with a fever of millions of suns.

Why do you keep coming back?!

She was right there in front of him, recognizable even though her form was indistinguishable from the numberless mass of souls around them. It was her voice that made him want to lose himself in the childish love he had for her, to wrap his arms around this pillar of light and bury his face into her, let his body burn to ash just so he could hold her and be held by her once more.

Then the Black Hole howled, and his descent into childish longing cut short.

“I'm getting you out of here.” And apparently dozens more, he could see out of the corner of his eye as they clambered towards him, the beacon. But his eyes were fixed on her. He took a step closer, reaching a hand out to her. “I... I know that when I take you back to earth, to the other side... you can be reborn. Reincarnation, Marion! It’s real!”

No, Peter, it’s--

“Yes, it is!” It may have been the exhaustion that drove his voice up a couple octaves, or the sense of being broiled alive as the souls drew around him, latching onto him and to his promise of safety from the hungry black holes and a second, third, or fourth life. He was partially aware that he had no need to screech, because the Black Hole wasn’t loud right now, even this close to feeding time.

Still, he screamed, “I see it happening all the time! With my own two eyes!” And due to what he was sure was dehydration, his voice cracked when he asked, “Why are you fighting me with this?”

Peter sensed a sigh from Marion, an impatience riddled with barely-kept frustration.

‘Cause you’re messing with things that you don’t understand. You think it’s simple as dragging me back to the living and forcing me to be born again so all of your attachment issues are fixed? Do you think this will fix how I died? IT WON’T!

If there had been oxygen in this hellhole, that blow to Peter’s chest would have knocked the air out of him. He blinked, feeling the threat of tears tickling the back of his eyes; they were probably already falling in the physical realm.

The Black Hole’s howl rang throughout his body, and he felt the beginning tug of the Black Hole’s inhalation. But an emptiness had already washed over him, and it felt like there was nothing about him for the Black Hole to consume.

“...You don’t want to come back.” It felt like a question, like he was begging her to say no, that she wanted to come back, despite her coming back to this place and dwelling here for how long time snaps or oozes here..

Her voice, stretched and nearly drowned out in the rushing wind of the Black Hole’s inhalation, was gentle this time, soothing. Even though she did not say what he wanted her to say.

What happens if I do come back? How would you even find me in my new life? You plan on coming back here over and over, pulling me out and making me live different lives until the universe ends?

Peter knew it was a rhetorical question, a challenge to the shortsightedness he went into this rescue mission with. He felt foolish and embarrassed when he answered with all the certainty left in his chest.

“Yes.”

The souls that didn’t get away fast enough lifted up to the screaming Void, Marion among them. The ones latching onto Peter urged him to leave this plane and take them with him. 

No.

She said it with such a heaviness that it shocked Peter. It wasn’t just resignation, or a parental exhaustion that came with raising a difficult child. It was a long-held acceptance. Peter felt her energy push against him, trying to force him back into the living world, and shoving away the souls constricting him so he could escape faster.

I love you, baby blue. Go home.

The void around him began to fuzz, overlaying with the brightness of his living room; he even felt the tickle of a rug and the oh-so needed coolness of his hardwood floor along his back. There was a moment that he felt he was choking on a hardness that won’t go down, and heard the faint cry of his cat next to his ear. He watched, gaping, as Marion’s soul lifted to the waiting, apathetic, selfish monster that was all of their end. In the living realm, he swallowed that lump and stuck his nails into the open bite until he felt the warm, coppery liquid fill his palm.

In the void, he screamed.

He screamed, flinging himself up and grabbing a surprised Marion, He screamed, throwing his weight down until Marion was ripped from the event horizon. He screamed, using that same momentum to throw her out of harm’s way and fly upwards into the Black Hole. He screamed, even louder than the Black Hole, his fist reaching out to sock it and, in the process, the atoms of his arm slowly pulling apart and getting sucked into the blackness.

He was all thirst for blood and mindless violence, thrashing against the dark surface that crawled all over his body. Peter didn’t know if he was trying to escape, yanking himself out of the mass like a drowning swimmer in a body of unforgiving and ravenous water, or if he was fighting it, clawing his way deeper inside until he found the core of this son of a bitch that he could rip apart with his teeth. Finally, finally, he had something to unleash his everything onto, with no consequences. This Black Hole is so hungry? Let it feast on eight decades of powerlessness as his brothers and sisters run the world to ruin, and the loneliness of being tolerated but not loved -- never loved. He fed this Black Hole the wild confusion born from, well shit, everything, all the big life questions he was always told to turn to this figment God for answers -- here was his God, here was everyone’s God: an uncaring universe that will rip itself apart no matter what helpless creature inhabited it, uncaring of its hopes and dreams and family and friends.

Peter blinked in and out of his black-out rage, catching snippets of the universe beyond the event horizon as it will happen: planets crashing into each other, stars spinning and forming as one, then galaxies; the water of Earth rising, the North Sea crashing into his fort until nothing -- nothing-- stood there,  then the giant ocean drying, and extraterrestrial creatures finally responding to the calls and pleas of a long-dead planet. The creatures from the other planets waging war against each other -- have they learned nothing from Earth?!-- until they, too, are extinct.

And then, the Collapse.

And it all made Peter madder! It made him scream louder, made him rip further into the Black Hole -- yes, this is a fight! -- made him claw apart this giant mass which he knew felt like nothing more than a flea biting a horse, but he will be damned if he didn’t become the most murderous little flea this Black Hole has ever dealt with!

With a final buzz, the Black Hole swallowed him.

--

This thing... what is this thing? This foreign object that sunk itself into the mass along with some of the other sources of energy and potential it had to collect and save. It felt odd and out of place, like it tried to rip itself out of the timeline from which it was born, a thing that tried to rip Fate and put it together to its liking.

It was stuck in a pose mid-thrashing, eyes squeezed shut tight, thin body twisted, hands gnarled into claws and legs stuck out wildly. It looked like a confused and scared infant, and the last of its dying screams made it sound like one, too. Perhaps a taste...

Eugh! No! Wretched! This thing, it tastes too... alive. A fruit that was a paradox of unripe and spoiled, with the sourness of not meeting his end yet and the arrogant taint of its attempt to rewrite the way of the universe. But it has the potential to be bursting with flavor of all the experiences it will live back on its right plane, a rich and delectable story to feed on when it meets its rightful end.

Until then...

--

And the Void spat him back out.

[aion-rsa]

Loki Episode 5 Review: Journey Into Mystery

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This review contains spoilers for Marvel’s Loki episode 5, WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.

Loki Episode 5

“I am Loki. God of Outcasts. They see themselves in me, and I in them. All of us, alone together. It’s why my stories always end with someone trying to put me in a box. And begin with my spectacular escape.”

An except there from Daniel Kibblesmith’s Loki #5, and quite a prominent theme of Loki’s story in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to date. Classic Loki (a spectacular Richard E. Grant) declared part of it aloud in the fifth episode of Loki when he told his gathered counterparts that they only have one part to play in the story of life, the universe, and everything: the God of Outcasts.

But throughout the series to date, Loki has borne witness to all his terrible flaws made flesh, and right about now he is just sick to death of them. From the God of Outcasts to the God of Losers to the God of Mischief, Loki is tired – so very tired – of himself. He’s also falling in love with himself, but I’m not here to perform that kind of emotional labor. He can take that shit to his therapist and work it out in private.

“Wherever you go, there you are” fits just as well for Loki episode 5’s theme, as Loki got to know some other versions of himself while stranded in the Void; their mistakes laid bare. Kid Loki killed Thor (you could’ve heard a pin drop), Classic Loki survived his Avengers: Infinity War encounter with Thanos by using his beefed-up sorcery …to hide. Alligator Loki ate his neighbor’s cat. Boastful Loki kicked both Iron Man and Captain America’s asses and went on to collect the Infinity Stone set, and “Vote Loki” was all about claiming political power on Midgard, I suppose.

It’s hard to pick an MVP from this gaggle of Lokis on the run. While it’s tempting to immediately choose Alligator Loki (literally every shot of him broke any serious moment with a laugh) or Kid Loki, who I am looking forward to inevitably joining a future Young Avengers lineup, Classic Loki wielded the most thematic impact by revealing what would have happened if Loki had evaded death in the “sacred” MCU timeline: weariness, loneliness, and a mile of regret. Loki really got a chance to see where all his worthless baggage was taking him, drawn heavily in the lines of Classic Loki’s face.

While there was both a lot of emotional resonance and fun to be had in this particular installment of the series, it did suffer from the traditional problems of a penultimate episode. It had “one last boss to fight” in Alioth before our Loki-Sylvie duo forged ahead to challenge the big bad, and we also had to go through the motions of “formulating a successful plan of attack,” all of which drove up enough excitement for the finale but didn’t really get us any closer to the end of our own journey into mystery. After last week’s shocks and surprises, there was bound to be a little calm before the storm, but I’m probably not the only one who hoped for a little bit more oomph in amongst the admittedly extremely distracting and gleeful collection of Marvel Easter eggs onscreen.

It was definitely a relief to see Mobius had managed to stay alive in the Void after being pruned at Judge Renslayer’s behest. Many thanks to Marvel for pulling its own “Lightning McQueen to the rescue” moment in a pizza delivery car – alright, it wasn’t a jet ski, but there’s still time. It seems that Loki has made a real friend in all this weirdness, and I hope that this will be a friendship that endures beyond the end of the series. Owen Wilson has been an excellent addition to the MCU and seems to have had a lot of fun playing the character.

Though it was a pleasure to spend some time with Mobius, the Lokis, and their stories, there was some awkward blanket time with Loki and Sylvie that I really could have done without. I will reiterate that I wish this romance wasn’t happening; it just feels weird as hell. I love Sylvie as a character but making her a love interest for Loki still feels unfortunate and way too rushed.

In the end, Loki and Sylvie managed to enchant Alioth by combining their growing power, but unfortunately it was too late to save Classic Loki, something I do not have it in my heart to forgive at this time. Yes, of course they managed to open a portal to the place beyond the Void in an effort to confront the entity who may truly be behind the creation of the TVA, but would it have killed them to get the job done a few seconds earlier?

Who will be revealed as the villain of this show next week? My first instinct – and one I had when the first trailer was released despite getting all the details laughably wrong – was that Loki and Sylvie were about to meet the MCU’s version of Doctor Doom. The castle we see in the distance looks eerily like the Doomstadt of Battleworld. But so many hints in the series thus far have teased a Kang the Conqueror appearance!

However, in the back of my mind lies another, perhaps more realistic fact: this is the third Marvel Disney+ series, and in the first two there were “big bad” mysteries that were resolved without introducing a new MCU character at the end. In WandaVision it was not Mephisto pulling the strings, but Agatha. In The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, the Power Broker turned out to be Sharon Carter. In Loki, it is therefore just as likely that the man behind the TVA curtain will be someone we’ve already met: Loki himself.

As always, I’m looking forward to all your thoughts and theories in the comments, and I’ll see you next week for the finale!

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

The post Loki Episode 5 Review: Journey Into Mystery appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2V7zg6S

[comicteaparty]

June 8th-June 14th, 2019 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from June 8th, 2019 to June 14th, 2019.  The chat focused on the following question:

What was the original incarnation of your current comic?  What has changed over the lifespan of the idea, and what has remained the same?

Nutty (Court of Roses)

My comic, Court of Roses http://courtofroses.thecomicseries.com/, was originally built around my first D&D character, a half-elf bard named Merlow the Rose. The comic was going to be strictly based on D&D, but as I started going gung-ho on the worldbuilding I started deviating away, making my own variations on races, making my own pantheon, and even formulating different magic rules and creatures. It's still largely inspired by D&D, and other fantasy works like Lord of the Rings, Elder Scrolls, etc., but I'm also trying to make the world my own, too!

Pencilz

My comic the Caraway Crew https://tapas.io/series/The-Caraway-Crew was originally based on my childhood friend group. Actually the very first incarnation I had with the Caraways was where we were all self-inserted into some large crossover fanfiction... it was pretty bad aha.(edited)

I just realized I said that twice oops

Draco Plato

The first incarnation of my comic....world was a Sailor Moon parody I believe. There was a boarding school and magical boys and girls that fought aliens or something. Firosofi was the "priest" of water and Affinity was the "priestess" of light (ironically her character hasn't seen the light of day in years). Apus was still around in that incarnation since Firosofi and Affinity were affiliated with it there too I think The initial premise still makes up the core of the Apus ideology I think; people fight in pairs against forces that threaten Earth. The focus since shifted to be much more character focused and on characters who were made much later (Damon and Lyall primarily). http://khyatix.com/

ErinPtah (Leif & Thorn | BICP)

But I'm A Cat Person http://bicatperson.com/ basically sprang into being (heh) fully-formed, but I pulled a bunch of the characters from earlier fanfiction incarnations. Jany and Kara Lynn got started in a Neopets RPG; Timothy was created as an OC member of Section XIII in Hellsing; Reseda and Cybele were from the same Sailor Moon exoplanetary team.(edited)

Leif & Thorn http://leifandthorn.com/ started as Colbert Report fanfiction XD It was so far removed from the source material that I spent years thinking "I should file off the serial numbers and try to publish this as an original work"...but it didn't click until I got away from the idea of doing a 1:1 adaptation of the fic's plot, and just used it as the foundation of a world where I could set all kinds of other stories.

AntiBunny

My comic AntiBunny http://antibunny.net/ started out as an all pencil sketchy comic about depression. It experimented a lot early on artistically as I tried to tear down my old style and build a new one. As it's changed over the years I've built up a new art style, and as I've changed as a person I'd say it's become its own story driven by the characters. The protagonist's depression and anxiety is still important, but I think the significant thing is that I'm seeing depression from the outside rather than the inside, and my writing has changed a lot as a result.

mathtans

Interesting topic. I might be unique in that my math comic started as a web serial (though I didn't know that's what it was at the time). Meaning text, but supplemented with drawings, because the point was that the graphs were character hairstyles: https://sites.google.com/site/taylorspolynomials/series/openbar

I gave it up after several years due to lack of interest, then brought it back as a web comic with many of the characters redesigned (parabola having twintails instead of bunny ears, for instance). http://mathtans.ca/ It then crossed over with the serial, meaning both sets of characters are canon and take place in the same universe. https://mathtans.blogspot.com/2017/04/math-character-bible.html

So the more it changes, the more it stayed the same? (As to plot, that tended to be whatever math concept I thought would be interesting, from archaic trig functions to fractals... I never knew where that'd be going.)

kayotics

The original incarnation of Ingress Adventuring Company https://ingress-comic.com/ was, like many other fantasy comics, derived from a D&D campaign I played in. I really loved the character I played (Toivo), and the campaign had finished, so I decided to keep using him in more stories. While the basic idea of the character is the same, I completely removed him from the campaign that he was in so I wouldn't have any issues with having to ask my friends to use their characters. Toivo has essentially remained the same, but large parts of his backstory and the entire setting has been changed from the original game I played him in. And, since I'm no longer tied to D&D with a comic, the rules of magic are a lot more vague. Similar to what Nutty said above, my comic is still largely inspired by D&D and other fantasy staples, but at least I can deviate from them as I continue to make my comic.

MJ Massey

Black Ball http://welcometoblackball.com/ is a much more recent idea of mine and hasn't really changed too much in terms of the overarching story, though minor things have shifted such as Maude becoming more of a main character, giving her a brother who is also getting more involved in the plot, and changing the role of a future character. But it's always been Emily and Chester solving a murder mystery.

MJ Massey

The shifts have been so minor and over time that it's hard to find where the "first draft" ends and the "next version" begins. But I've been mentally shifting things as I go along and see that certain aspects of the story need more attention for the ending to pay off or for the character to get well developed

Who the murderer is has stayed the same and how it happens and why. Just the circumstances around it have been smudged and fixed

Tuyetnhi

The OG plans I had for https://oiydcomic.com/ occurred after I was fiddling with twine to make a one shot short story, and an illustration series/zine project after having an intense dream. At first, I initially wanted to create it into an ero-romance comic about a woman having a one night stand with her dream lover, eventually living together after seeing each other for a few weeks. After thinking about it further (and some beta readers later lmao), I decided to develop into a romance-focused drama about acceptance and making life more than what is instilled in our dreams. I fleshed out Cara's (main character) modivations, her background in regards on courtship and romance somewhat seen in the asian-american experience (specifically Vietnamese-american rituals; some that retained after viet dispora came to the US in the late 80's - 90's and the effects on their children). Basically, from intense escapism to a general exploration on romance. With some common themes I've liked in 90's shoujo with some criticisms here and there.(edited)

Respheal

Galebound (http://www.galebound.com/) started off as what was going to be a short story. I posted it up on deviantART just for fun, and I was totally pantsing the plot xD I had an idea of a magician who for some reason couldn't ask questions, and the stablehand he kidnapped when he wasn't getting a horse fast enough. The original idea was that Din was on the run from something? And Conan was that hapless stablehand the protags burst in on like "I need a horse!" before escaping $antagonist or chasing someone. Originally Din was supposed to be a good guy, for real, just...more of a trickster to Conan's straight-faced act(edited)

Since its inception, the plot got way deeper and a gazillion times more horrible I think at one point an Obligation wasn't necessary for magic, and probably wasn't even totally compulsory But then the Pascal Incident happened and making the Obligation compulsory suddenly became much more integral to the plot and world. And once that happened, Din's backstory got more fleshed out and his character got darker. I still really wasn't sure what to do with Conan at that point, though. That didn't hit me until like seven years after the original five chapter draft going up on dA, and knowing Conan better changed everything It's fun :'D

snuffysam

Super Galaxy Knights Deluxe R (http://sgkdr.webcomic.ws/) started off as a short film I made for an introductory film class in college (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibRdxNLd3Q4). The film is about a fan of a really bad anime forcing his boyfriend to sit through an episode. The production quality of the film is honestly really bad in retrospect (still got an A though lol). At around the same time as I was making that film, I had just watched... I assume Food Wars, and I was on a real "you could make a battle series out of anything" stint. Like, I would just have a notes document full of ideas like "a shonen series about math olympiads". One idea I really liked was "a shonen series, but it's actually just The Wizard of Oz". After I had finished the short film, I wondered what the actual series that the "anime" took place in would be like, so I decided to build out a comic. I outlined five books, the first being based primarly off the Wizard of Oz. And... the rest is history.

deo101

The first incarnation of millennium (http://millennium.thecomicseries.com/) was pretty much a "chosen one" story where the main character had to go kill an evil space queen and was the only one who could do it. I made about 6 more stories that I later decided I could put together, and the easiest way for me to combine them all was a highschool space story, which I developed for quite a while... Later I changed them all to be adults and started building the current iteration of the story (which has also changed a ton)

Desnik

My WIP comic (which has an ask blog: http://ask-a-warlock.tumblr.com/) started out as a video game idea incorporating Banjo Kazooie collectathon platforming with Ace Attorney trial mechanics....obvs I'm not much of a programmer or 3D modeler, so I went with skills that I actually know how to do: Write and draw(edited)

It had one incarnation where the characters run around all of Europe but it was much too much to develop within 250 pages so I scrapped that and focused on one standalone story, which I'm thumbnailing now and I'm hoping to get into the art stage by the end of the year

and now the page count is about 170 so hopefully that's an easier project to wrangle, when it comes down to it