#so i have been completely immune to this 'trend'

[9hikers]

the tragic part about micro-communities is that sometimes i'll see a post where some poor sap is getting fed up over smthing like "why is nonbinary always woman-lite" or "stop assuming all asexual people are sex-repulsed", meanwhile i'm over in my separate bubble always having the exact opposite problem

oh to trade places, but for a moment

[shaesinflames]

🌥️ Rainbow Factory Infection AU🌥️

Hello everypony!! Ive been loving the infection stuff and wanted to jump onto the trend myself with an AU that came to me very suddenly. I'm gonna try and get all my thoughts out here:

☁️ Scootaloo fails her flying assessment by getting disqualified for checking on her injured friend who had crashed during their turn. The two of them get taken to the Rainbow Factory as a punishment for their failure, and quickly realize the deadly situation they're in.

🌈 There are few dozen pegasi there already. All of their wings have been torn off of them, their cutiemarks are branded over, and chains are fastened around either their legs or neck. They all seem so... dull. As if the color has been stolen from them.

☁️ Rainbow Dash enters to examine the new sacrifices, and is mortified when she sees Scootaloo. She had trained her every day to prevent this from happening; she never wanted the pony she thought of as a little sister to end up here. Dash had to quickly decide if she was more loyal to her career, or to her friends.

🌈 She chooses Scootaloo. This does not go over well. Whether you enter the Rainbow Factory as a prisoner or an employee, you were not allowed to leave until you died. Rainbow Dash grabs Scootaloo and attempts to flee with her.

☁️ A chase ensues. She realizes that even if they do escape, they wouldn't be free. They would be hunted for as long as the factory existed. The answer suddenly seems obvious. Dash veers away from the exit and heads deeper into the building, straight for the core.

🌈 Because of her high status in the company (and a lot of kicking), Rainbow Dash gets into the restricted access room and corrupts the core, sparking a reactor meltdown. Her and Scootaloo manage to escape seconds before the core collapses, and the Rainbow Factory is lost to the rainbows it created.

☁️ Not long after, ponies begin to emerge from the ruins. Well, they seem to still be ponies. Mostly ponies. The Inital Victims. The pegasi who had been deemed useless and dispensable in one way or another, and had been put through torture for weeks or months in order to drain them of their very magic and soul.

🌈 The Victims seem to have a symbiotic relationship with the Rainbow Infection in their body. They live just out of reach of death; gaunt and hollow, yet somehow surviving. Blind, weak, and terrified, they seem to believe they're still trapped in the factory, and will viciously maul any living being they sense with a newfound strength. So far, they don't seem to be curable, or killable.

☁️ The Infected pegasi have a much more unpleasant experience. Every waking moment is nothing but agony as the infection consumes their magic and feast on their vessel, reducing them to nothing more than another fluffy white cloud looming in the sky.

🌈 The Infected aren't hostile, and seem to still be lucid up until their death. However, they are incredibly contagious, and the final stage of the infection seems to be designed specifically to further the disease.

☁️ Unicorns and Earth ponies are completely immune to the Rainbow Infection. Alicorns are not. The princess's have been barricaded in Celestia's castle to protect them all.

🌈 Without any pegasi to moderate the weather, it has become increasingly unpredictable and harsh, making typical farm work almost impossible. The Survivors are getting low on rations, and they're getting desperate and hungry.

I think thats about it. Idk at the time of writing this its 3am lol.

[centrally-unplanned]

Richard Hanania is one of my poster child writers for the "he is an complete idiot and also very smart" genre. I disagree with him on virtually everything, particularly core beliefs, but he nonetheless is an actual critical thinker who will come up with and explore interesting ideas, and so he is valuable to follow for exposure to good discussion from a world you are otherwise not gonna touch (and for a good laugh the other half of the time).

This is definitely one of those posts - the US right (not that the left is immune to this by any stretch, this is just about the right) is so infused with an instinct towards perpetual victmization that it becomes easy to buy into their own framing that the Right has been losing front after front in the culture war. This is the foundational premise of The Cathedral, the Moldbug-coined New Right tenet that "Cthulhu Always Swims Left" aka the left's structural advantage in controlling ~institutions~ means that in status-quo modernity culture will shift left over and over, endlessly...and therefore you need to violently overthrow the state and purge the corrupt neoliberal bureaucratic order to realize the will of the silent volke embodied in a CEO-Monarch to turn back the tide. Anyway, Hanania does a good job of pointing out that its really kinda bullshit. Tons of our culture has turned right over the past decades; gun control, education, and economics are the big topics that he mentions, and of course more exist, and its been a result combinations of public opinion shifting and the power of the state implementing agendas, aka normal politics.

Some of this is a bit of an overstatement - victories on like abortion for example haven't shifted minds, but instead exploited the US's ludicrous legal system to back-door legislative reform through the courts, its not a replicable experience in many other contexts or any other country. But the point overall stands, which gestures at the real problem - the only topic where the New Right's analysis 'holds up' is onthe sexual revolution and queer rights, revealing a movement irrationality obsessed with the sex front of the culture war. Here Hanania stumbles into his stupidity on why the right hasn't been successful fighting this, not really grappling with the fact that for example gay marriage is just really popular, this is a bottom-down fundamental sea change in how people view sex and society's role in policing it.

The mistake The Cathedral devotees make in analyzing society is that they take a single sip from a branch of the river of History and assume they have drunk it dry; Society swam left from 1950 to 1980, and the New Right cannot help but obsess endlessly over that transition as The Future. Note how common this is - so many people harken to "the 1950's" as the steady-state idyll of American society, the American economy, identify as 'traditional' everything from holiday songs to food recipes that were all invented around this time and have no older origin than that. Its all myths, and The Cathedral is an extension of that trend - by identifying US society in 1950 as a centuries-old continuity of tradition, it sees the changes of the ensuing decades as a radical discontinuity, and therefore a terrifying new normal.

It is wrong the same way nostalgia-memes are wrong; history never had a steady state, and people's ideas of even the 1950's themselves are primarily myth. Turns out historical conceptions of queer relationships have varied widly across time and space - none have been as progressive as today, but societally sanctioned spaces for queer relationships are legion. There has never been a steady state on sex and society.

But! Modernity *is* different from the past, and certain things have changed irrevocably - there is a verison of The Cathedral that is true. Technology & economic development have radically changed how we lived, from a society of farmers and their rulers to a society of urban professional workers. Cultural norms around sex & society varied all over the place; but (to radically simplify, there are a bunch of other factors) marriage for children to work the farms was near-universal, it was a structural necessity culture was built upon. This was a harsh limiter on sexual norms - said marriage for children needed to undergird it. That limiter is gone, forever, today. To not dive into it because its not the focus, with the limiter gone I don't think the 'sexual revolution', feminism, and queer rights is going to revert in a major way in the future.

Which will permit the right, as long as it stays maniacally obsessed with the idea that people don't have 1950's sexual morality anymore, to claim that they Always Lose. This is why Hanania stumbles, making the opposite mistake - seeing the failure to fight the sexual revolution as just a failed southern offensive in comparison to a successful northern attack on the front of education. The real trap is to not understand that culture is not freely malleable, only some of it is 'up for grabs' from the perspective of activists. Within the new status qup equilibrium of modernity, shifts right and left are not only possible but inevitable - but the rules of game have to be understood. Hanania may have only gotten halfway there, but props to him for opening my eyes to the contradiction.

[jorisjurgen]

Fellow "put that guy in situations" liker I see, hello 🤝 I figure you're the best person to get serious thoughts on this stuff because it's been driving me insane and I need someone to be Completely Normal with

How do we feel about Joris s4 portal sickness scene. And how it wasn't played up for laughs as much as Ankama does with literally everyone else. Do you think he was actually worse off than they showed on screen, or did he actually have some sort of immunity/quick acclimation to it, especially since it never comes up again despite him being put through an absolute gauntlet of portal-taking almost immediately after that?

What about how the trend in portraying him on-screen goes from "cool and collected and untouchable" in the earlier seasons to "gets the shit kicked out of him and is regularly looked down on" in the comic (yeeted into a nearby mountain/hit by lightning, for example), OVA, and s4? The "guy who 1-hit KOs a big bad" to "guy who gets literally carried around like a sack of potatoes for 50% of his screentime" pipeline was insane to witness.

Actually I would love to hear your thoughts on that too. Why WAS he being carried around so much in s4? One of the fastest guys around in that group, yet they barely let him jump through any portals himself. Do they just think he's weakened and reluctant because of the portal sickness. Is it literally just because he's small and it's more convenient this way. The people need to know

Sorry if this is a lot out of nowhere, I think we all have the same disease (insane about crepinjurgen things and overanalyzing everything)

I hope you don't mind but I also shared this ask with @dullard because we're both insane.

Me: I do think it was played for laughs, but in a subtle way - the same way other characters throwing up due to Yugo has been. Idk. I think that the reason for him slowly becoming a Funny Character is a either a ludonarrative one (he's besties with the gang = he can be joked about. Going through a portal and throwing up is like a rite of passage for Yugo's friends) or one of Ankama wanting to develop him in this direction (a cool calm badass of a character? Will be popular, maybe. A cool calm badass of a character who has a collection of plushies, lives with his dad for 600 years, has an entire spin-off series about being neglected by his mentally ill father as a child, and is 3ft tall and sensitive about it? Makes people fucking insane for years to come)

(also I guess ankama shares my hc of Joris being a glass cannon "if he gets hit one time he will die but if he hits You one time, you die instead." type character.)

As for the portal sickness, it's either that he a. gets used to it quickly, either naturally or because of his weird physiology, b. is SO passionate about hiding it that the sheer threat of embarrassment is enough to gather the willpower to not be sick (very in character ngl.)

My thoughts on Joris being carried around are the exact same as Dullard's so I'll pass the mic to him.

Dullard:

[mitziholder]

I was watching another gc lesbian asking about how butch and femme are different than performing gender, and all the comments were like "you need to go and experience lesbian culture and hear about people's experiences and why butch and femme are important", stuff like that. To me it sounds very similar to how TRAs fight tooth and nail to defend prescribed gender roles because it's "literally their identity" and taking away their autonomy and community how they socialize based on these roles. Long standing and commonly accepted socialization roles aren't immune to criticism imo. I look forward to more dialogue about this though this is just an observation I had

yeah, it is just one part of a general trend I’ve noticed in gc/rad-adjacent spaces, which is the relatively superficial change that a lot of self-identified gc feminists undergo in Becoming GC (or “Peaking”)

you take something stupid (ignorant and uncritical appreciation of Queer and Trans History) and, with very little consideration of the underlying processes which led to that thing, you switch it out for something equally stupid (ignorant and uncritical appreciation of Feminist and Gay History)

what you have then is a group of people who are still ravenously, violently protective of the things they perceive as sacred/unimpeachable representations of their culture... only it’s radfem/gay culture instead of stonewall.

>To me it sounds very similar to how TRAs fight tooth and nail to defend prescribed gender roles because it's "literally their identity" and taking away their autonomy and community how they socialize based on these roles

obviously anyone behaving like that does not have a very strong sense of self. so, if you threaten to “take away” their cultural Script, they don’t know what to do, because merging one’s identity with a cause or culture breeds a painful amount of personal investment in how it works and how it is perceived. this results in coping via:

a) attacking anyone who criticizes it (even in the most sympathetic manner)

b) digging heels in and resolving to ignore that it is not and never has been perfect

if they do eventually wrap their heads around the fact that their idols were human beings with a mix of good and bad ideas, it has the potential to drive them completely insane... thus the so-called terf-to-trad pipeline, symptomatic of the immaturity/malleability common in people who latch on to social movements in an effort to avoid thinking for themselves.

[popculturebuffet]

Helluva Boss: Fizzarolli and Ozzie retrospective He, Mammon (Patreon Review for Brotoman.exe)

Happy almost valentine's day you happy people! While i'm deeply alone romantically, like many I can take comfort in the wonderful world of shipping. It's jsut nice to see two character bond or two think about two character sbonding even if one is a clone whose life's ambition is to be batman and the other is a teenager named after edged weapons. Bonus points if you figure it out. Point is i'm not immune to a good romantic endorphin rush, and not opposed when one of my patrons has the same idea, so as part of our buid up to valentine's day, we're taking a look at the most stable couple on one of the most unstable show arounds. One's a clown who sounds like Beetlejuice, the other's a giant rooster god of lust. Somehow they make it work.

I haven't really covered Helluva Boss episode to episode on here less out of neglect and more because I intended to juts review the seasons. And while tha'ts still something I do for shows frequently with so many NEW shows coming out I can do season reviews for and such a tight schedule, not ot mention shows people pay me to do a whole season of, I realized it was a bit unwiedly so was glad to do this when Brotoman suggested the mid season special and I upped it to a full on retrospective.

It's also been a WHILE since I did a character focus retrospective, the last one being Tom from star vs the forces of evil and I intended way more, life just got in the way. I mean I have retrospectives that are only getting done thanks to the kindness of others paying for them, allowing me to put them back on the board easier. So this is an experiment to see if I can do this again and if anyone else is intrested in one of these, drop me a line. Mos tprobably won't be this short, but I do like doing these, seeing how a character evolves... and it's also nice that unlike most i've thoguht of the character in question hasn't been horribly screwed over.

Anyways it is nice to cover helluva boss and opens the door to cover other episodes or clusters of episodes, another thing i'd be more than happy to do on comission or my own damn time. Now the shamless self promotion is over join me under the cut to talk about gay clowns, literal cocks, less gay australian clowns, looking at this, fire, kidnapping fetishes, burgers, viiibratttorrrrsss, sexy fish persons, public humilation and spenting life bent over with someones fis tin their a.

Loo Loo Land

Fizzy's history on the show is a bit weird. The first glimpse we see of our faviorite gay clown isn't ACTUALLY him but his non union robot equilvent. In fact the episode dosen't make it clear FIzz is an actual person and this is a robot of him, Robofizz comes off as a chucky cheese style mascot complete with a horrifying army behind him, with only word of god at the time (I assume as I got into the show around "The Harvest Moon Festival), revealing that Fizz was a real person with a real history with blitzo. Blitzo's hatred of "that fucking clown" seems to be about having to work with robofizz in the past.

That being said this brief apperance nad inevieitble park torching fight with an anamatronic which happens every time Blitzo goes to a theme park, does set up a lot of things about Fizz that are key to his character and apperances: We see his resentment of Blitzo is so great his robots picked it up, that he works at mammon's mascot and that he's famous and succesful enough at Clowning, Blitzo's former dream job, that he has robots of himself. He also, likely not concidentally, first shows up in an episode with Blitzo and Stolas, a trend that would only be broken with MAMMON'S MAGNIFICENT MID SEASON SPECIAL, and an intentional one.

Loo Loo Land in fact gives us a good intro to Stolas and Blitz's relationship. While their "Transactional fucking" had shown up in the pilot and murder family, with my faviorite gag of the show spotlighting the start of the affair

And the second setting up their monthly fuck fest, this is the first episode that really shows how the two FEEL about the situation: Stolas is clearly infatuated beyond just sex: while he couches everything in how fuckable blitz is, he also makes an excuse to see him by having him bodyguard him and octavia for the day. We also get a sense of just HOW awkward he is, calling him "The only man who can fuck me" to his daughte'rs confusion and grossing both Blitz and Octavia out by greeting blitz with a sensual "Well hello my big dicked blitzy". The resulting one of the fuck is a close second to sorry I fucked your husband, might even top it. It's clear Stolas dosen't JUST want to fuck Blitz, enjoying seeing him on the job, flirting with him.. but it's also clear WHy Blitz is so annoyed with the situation and with said flirting. Stolas can't go two mintues without saying something sexual, which given what we learn about his realtionship makes sense; He dosen't realyl seem to know the diffrence between romantic love and sexual love and thus combines the two. Blitzo spends the episode trying to be professional as he's "not a day hooker"> He's fine with fucking to get what he wants but sees this relationship as nothing more for both of them while it's Clear stolas is , in his own fucked up way, trying to introduce the two. It's just he phrases it with dicks so Blitzo dosen't realize that's what this partly is, and Octavia , SHOCKINGLY wants no part in meeting her fathe'rs lover she's afraid he'll run away with. It's only her running away herself that makes him realize MAYBE inviting his side piece to the park with his daughter while his marriage is falling apart around him and said daughter can see it every day was a bit of an oopsie.

As for Fizz himself he's played by Alex Brightman, best known for playing beetlejuice, who does a fantastic job here, using the beetlejuice voice to great effect. His first song of the series "Loo Loo Land" is great, a cheesy theme park song right out of chuck e cheese or a children's stage show. We also get nice hints at Mammon LONNNNGGG Before we actually met him, and it's nice to know Viv .. really had the sins planned out fully before their debuts. While we don't see him the fact he made a tacky theme park he blantantly stole from Lucifer, gladly let's his attractions steal from the big boss of hell's own daughter by singing a verison of "I have a dream", and the fact the park has no saftey standards, a ton of lawsuits an da mascot that's a pervert undre there. It sets up both how shoddy greed is and how shoddy Mammon's products are way before we actually meet him.

We also get a fun subplot where Richard Steven Horvitz pisses himself off and does a fun goofy voice. Good times. Loo Loo Land is a great episode.. but an okay-ish intro to fizzy. but it was intended to simply TEASE at the man himself as a few episode and a year or two later... we get

OZZIES

OZZIE's is where our boy gets a proper introduction along side his boss, love of his life and best friend Ozzie, aka Osmodeous, the sin of lust.

Ozzy's intro is a big milestone in Hellaverse history as it's the first time we properly met one of the Seven Deadly Sins. It's easy to forget how big a deal this was now we've also met hot lava lamp fox, clown bastard man and depression dad 2: he did your wives, but before this episode was promoted it wasn't a sure thing the sins would even show up in hellva. Our heroes are mostly small time and one of the sins was tied to Hazbin, which at the time had nothing resembling a release date or schedule. So having one be suddenly announced for the season finale was a big suprise.

It's also one of my faviorite thing the franchise is had: While Viv and co go all out for the designwork, the series has some of the best extras in all of animation, the sins naturally get some of the best of the best, each embodying their animal theme while also being gloroius. Ozzie himself gets a great one with tiny heads I forget exist, chest hair (feathers? fuck man I don't know) a glowing neon suit, and a massive tail, with a giant size that shows off just HOW far the gap is in status and power between him and the rest of the cast, and allowing him to dwarf both his boyfriend and unfortunate victim Moxxie. It's also hilarous in hindsight as Bee ,at least in regular mode is normal sized and Lucifer is a short king.

One last personal note on this that has nothing to do with the matter of hand but what the heck: wait for the sins reminds me more of the various gem fusions from steven universe, something exciting as hell every time it comes up but also agonizing fanwork wise while you wait for them to finish the set.

Anyways Ozzie's setup is simple as it is fucked up: Moxxie and Millie are having their one year anniversary. It's weird to think given HOW close they are it's really only been a year. I mean the relationship could be longer. We don't know.

Blitzo naturally wants to be a third wheel, which Moxxie shoots down even harder than usual. Blitzo agrees.. then stalks them to their date anyway. Unfortunately for him it's one of the biggest restraunts/sex clubs in all of hell, probably the biggest and the bouncer is used to guys trying to fuck him to get in. Blitz.. has to call for backup.

This is where Stolas' genuine feelings for blitz really start to come through: previously the show played coy, having just enough hints that he reallyc ared.. but also having him call Blitz thigns like "his little imp', mock his buisness, or hit on him in front of a large crowd. And this was all in one episode. Stolas LIKES Blitz.. but due to his insulated spoiled background and his only relationship having been with one of the worst people in hell or heaven, only topped by a genocidal dude bro, the clown from it's australian cousin, a homophobic controlling abusive mobster, and a rapist. It's easy to see WHY Stolas had no idea HOW to talk to Blitz properly or to actually ask if he wanted the cutsey nickname. He's never HAD to think about how someone feels.

Yet when Blitzo calls for the date.. he lights up. He's happy, overdresses and rushes to go meet him, easily getting them in and is happy to genuinely TRY to get to know him. It just dosen't work as the way he'as acted.. means Blitz dosen't GET that he's trying or that he enjoys this date and just wants to stalk his employees

Karma however bites Blitz hard as he was so focused on stalking.. he forgot who runs this place.. and thus whose EMCEEING THIS PLACE: Fizz.

While this episode was already one of the series best hindsight helps it.. mostly. The show could've been better on following it up as both Moxxie finding out Fizz is at the club and Blitzo telling off stolas only have subtle effects afterwords, and the actual argument ove rit.. is releigated to a tex message fight we see in Western Energy.

The episode DOES however only gain more from later ones when it comes to Fizzy: When we see him on stage it's instantly clear that he's not so famous just because he works for Mammon and that he dosen't have his job because he's fucking the owner: Fitz is genuinely talented, doing fun crowd banter and some acrobatics. It's also clear he genuinely loves working the crowd and people in general. Sure he's about to spend most of the episode mocking someone who just wanted to serenade his wife, but for the most part he actually seems to like bantering with the guests.. except the guy who bought like 4 of his sex robots. Keep that guy away from him.

It also sets up one of the keys to the character: He's a mirror of blitz. It's something I didn't have fully sink in till I watched this video from sarcastic chorus. I originally had the link in there but i've tried ot ease off youtube that way as it instantly becomes the page image for some reason when used in a link.

I don't agree with the guy on everything, but I respect his opinons and this one was so obvious in retrospect I can't belivie I didn't notice. But Fizzy.. is who blitz WANTED to be: a performer, rich, in a circus. He still got the office he wanted as a kid, but it's clear Blitzo's life didn't work out the way he wanted it to: mostly alone with two friends he keeps harassing and a daughter who takes a whole season and a yearlong delay thanks to record company jackassery to tell him she loves him and finally admit he's her dad. He's a deeply lonely person who loves his job but wishes he had more and the one possible relationship he does have is rife with power imbalance issues.

In contrast, Fizzy seemingly has it all: he's famous across all the rings as a performer, has tons of merch in his name, a regular gig at one of the nicest places in hell and a loving boyfriend who supports him and is there for him. The worst he seems to have in this episode is PRETENDING like he and Ozzzy are doing more than fucking, and that's , at least for now, more an image thing. Fizzy has everything Bltiz ever wanted and seeing him only drives that in..a nd makes it clear the second Fizz sees him shit's going to get bad.

Staying low though.. isn't really an option, as Moxxie done goofs up, singing a love song at a sex club. Granted... Fizzy and Ozzie are giant dicks here, singing a long, gorgeous song about how stupid Moxxies being and how he shoudl sing about doing his wife. It's also hilarious in places, with Fizzy pulling out his reading glasses and has two of the series best extras in these two

I like big beformets and I cannot lie. And skinny ones too clearly. No idea how the candle thing works though.

The song.. is fantaI stic, one of the series best, and a big showcase for James Monroe engleheart, who didn't really get to sing as Vortex. The series also wasn't a full musical yet so that didsn't help. But it's clear Viv knew who she had and thus gave him a giant, most of the episode number that steals the damn show and sells just how IMPOSSING ozzie is and how fucked Moxxie is.

Thankfully they change targets as Blitz TRIES to do something heroic and stand up for M and M.. but does so by both revealing he followed them here, and you know... that he watches tehm have sex. Granted MOXXIE already knew that

But it's still a weird thing to admit in public. So Fizz zeroes in on him, as does Veroskia whose been sorely missed this season. But hey ANY cristina vee is good cristina vee. Stolas dosen't get off easy as Ozzie points Stolas out and connects the dots and joyfully sings about he sold his life for a thrust.

It's.. weird going back to this one as in their next appearnce.. these two.. aren't antagonists. Fizz is hostile to Blitzo.. but as we learn he has every reason to be. With them debuting like this, it was easy to assume that they were yet another set of rogues to be added to the gallery, instead of valuable allies. It feels like a delberate bait and switch that MOSTLy works: thier a bit TOO cruel here to completely buy it.. but there's hints at who they are behind closed doors and it DOES make sense contexually: Moxxie did pick a sex club to do his song at instead of ANYWHERE else, simply because it was a big fancy place, so a little mockery is fair, and Fizz zeroing in on blitz is.. entirley in character given he truly hates the guy at this point. Only Ozzie saying what he did about stolas "trading his life for a thrust" feels disgenouious and even then he might simply not know the many complicated factors involved like Stella being awful or how much the divorce affected Octavia. The two know each other and it's clear from Oops stolas can easily book a meeting with the guy, but they aren't really FRIENDS or anything.

Still the two DO get their compuance as Millie wacks Fizz with a guitar. Sure they have to get out, but ... I mean Millie got away with el kabonging the boyfriend of one of the rulers of hell. That's still a hell of an achievement.

We also have the Stolits fallout which is still one of my faviorite scenes of the show. I talked about it in depth in my best episodes of 2021 list, but it's just so heartbreakingly good, even better having rebinged the series recently: you see how it's evolved, how Blitzo has this impression.. and how him laying it out really lays it in for Stolas how badly he fucked up and knowing what we know now, the last shot of Blitzo sobbing after seeing his mom.... it somehow hurts more.

The Circus

Full Confession: I almost forgot to put this one in here. I know, big oversight but it's easy to jump from Ozzies to Oops, which functions as a sequel to the former. The Circus itself is a sequel AND a prequel, both showing Stolas finally divorcing Stella after Ozzies and showing Stolas and Blitzo's pasts including just how we got to "sorry I fucked your husband", an origin story worthy of telling if ever there was one.

And while it is indeed mighty the main thing we're here for is Fizz.. whose in about maybe two, three minutes of the episode tops. But while I nearly glossed over this it is important as we finally see how the two interacted as kids: Fizz was both a star performer AND a surrogate son to Blitzo's dad while Blitzo... simply didn't have it yet. IT's clear from his acrobatic skills and poster in his office he later found his niche with his sister but as a kid he just didn't have the natural talent Fizz did and his morbid humor, referring to the only horse of his that dosen't explode as having lost it's legs from diabettes, simply dosen't fit the setting, while Fizzy, even as a child, is deft as hell at reading the crowd.

While the two are very diffrent.. it's clear BLitz and Fizzy were still super tight and simliar enough to play together. Granted Fizzy wants him to knock off the diabites jokes or he'll punch him, fizzy dosen't mind Blitzo's over the top violence or weirdness. It's clear he was one of the few people who ever understood this guy.. so what happened... wellllll

Oops!

While OZZIE's introduced these two hypocrites, it's Oops! that fleshes them out as people, as the episodes starts with the two when their not putting on a sex show for everyone. Their still horny as shit, I mean one of them IS lust himself, but it's clear while it's fuck o clock a lot at Ozzie's tower, the two have a loving supportive relationship that's just.. downright adorable.

It's shown from the start: Fizz is asleep on Ozzie's chest, wakes up, gets them coffee, and then wakes his lover up with an airhorn, a thing that clearly happens a lot and is a running bit with the two (Don't blame me blame how fucking fun they are) and we see the two help each other get ready for the day: Fizz wakes Ozzie up, prepares his schedule complete with these really fun reading glasses

I'm a sucker for someone wearing glasses that resemble 3d glasses.. or just 3d glasses like that one guy in back to the future

That guy is, without exageration

THE SHIT

It shows that while Fizzie's clearly the weirder flighteter one of the two, he still supports his boyfriend well and in a way that's vital: he's essnetially ozzie's assitant and he apparently has one or two as seen by this lady that walks in on them later.

Fun fact, I think she's really cute. Also fun fact I think her walking in, them doing couple shit and then trying to act like they were just fucking is just something she has to put up with every day. I mean this...

This isn't the look of someone whose COMPLETELY suprised by this, it's more the look of someone whose like "Okay you two keep kidding yourselves just leave me out of it".

Anyways back to the point at hand, Fizz still clearly does a lot for Ozzie and in turn Ozzie makes breakfast, resigned to the fast he just gets. .assigned this job... and to the fact of Fizz tried it again we'd die. I picture Fizz trying to make a pee wee herman style breakfast device and it going terribly. I also figure with Fizz's love of burgers for breakfast he orders burger king a disturbing amount and Ozzie is fine with it.

Anyways it's a sugary sweet scene but said cute freckle imp and /or sucuubus lady lady run in shows the contrast: between who they are in private and the face they put on for the public, that Fizz is just a fuck toy. It also highlights that it's.. unecessary. Their assitant dosen't seem to care and is more weirded out at the half assed show they put on for her. As we establish next episode practically everyone in hell who knew about the two knew it. Their only fooling themselves to keep up apperances. I COULD be wrong and there could be some fallout from them going public, we'll get to that later, but given we've now met Lucifer... I dont' think he'd care much about the sins acting like their sins as long as they get the shit they do done and keep their citizens happy. As long as Ozzy's willy wanka dildo factory is going strong, he dosen't give a shit. Man's got ducks and depression to keep him company. And now his daughter but we don't know where those episodes take place in relation to each other. Did helluva season 2 synch up with Hazbin season 1's 6 month, was it just season 1? Am I insane am I blind I just can't seem to trust so many regulations comin back at ya? viv please clear this up if you haven't already.

Where was I? Oh yes, point is the two really put on a show for a public that mostly dosen't care more than themselves. The only conflict they have is that Fizz wants to go out alone, and while Ozzie wanting to go with him everywhere COULD be a read flag.. Fizz is going to the greed ring which literally has a town called ransom. Like I said, Lucifer dosen't give a shit. OR didn't. Again this timeline is a lot to take in.

Fizz promises to be incognito.. but being both a literal fucking clown and Blitzo's foil... he arrives in a dildo confetti canon limo, with an army of queeves (dog like creatures that can strip someone to bone), this lasted all of 0 seconds.

It's then Fizz runs into an old friend.. yes it's Blitzo o clock as he was just getting coffee and happened to run into his old friend turned enemy he's seen all of once and the two argue for a bit, with Fizz accusing blitzo of stalking him, Blitzo pointing out how shitty a stalker that'd make him and then calling Fizz a purse dog, the only thing tha tgeninely pisses him off.

Just to prove this opening set piece runs on conicdence, just outside we run into two old foes; Crimson, moxxie's homophobic mafia don father and Striker, our faviorite cowboy imp suprimacist jackass. I like this use of both: Striker had already had his rematch with the m's and is still a personal enough foe to Blitzo, fucking with his bread and butter and all, to work solo, while Crim.. is a mafia don. Of course he has more things to do than plot revenge against his son.

It also underlines something about the show that was easy to forget in season 1: the villians.. aren't arc based for the most part. Striker and Stella are exceptions but most are introduced to likely have an episode later. Granted they could follow up on these characters faster, but I get that guys like the CHERUBS, DHORKS and crim himself, while likely having an end point at some point, are more threats to bring back later than a recurring backbone of the series. So bringing crim in for a normal day of buisness for him works. He's the crime boss of the greed ring, why woudln't he be doing crime boss things when not plotting his son's death.

In this instance it' sa job interview: Striker, presumibly fuming at how Stella alterted the deal and thus fucked up his chance to kill a royal, has decided to change bosses to someone more his speed. Crim wants a demonstration.. and our heroes happen to be outside arguing so he lassoes them in. Fizzy is now a hostage and Blitzo is a co-hostage simply because Striker assumes their friends

The upside of this kidnapping is it gives the two a chance to hash things out.. which naturally STARTS tense, as it tends to do when the last time you've spoken in 20 years involved public humilation and not the fun kind.

So naturally Blitzo tears into fizz, assuming OZzie dosen't care the relationship won't work etc etc, really just projecting every insecurity he has about him and stolas onto them, not able to accept a royal and an imp having an actual relationship. .because it'd force him to consider it actually possible and that the heartfelt texts, check ins and other stuff Stolas has been sending him since , presumibly Western energy (since their text history seems to only go back to the day after ozzies), and Stolas' genuine attempts to respect Blitz's space since, not flirting with him nearly as agressively and using his actual name. It's clear to everyone BUT Blitzo Stolas is putting in an actual effort, learned from his mistakes, and is trying... and the reason it isn't is that BLitzo KNOWS he is, can tell now on some level he wants more.. but his deep inscurties, the mess he's made of his previous relationships and his DEEP self loathing from events we're about to get into and others we likely aren't privy to yet make that hard. It's hard to accept that someone LOVES him and dosen't just want to fuck him and it's harder to accept this just.. might work.

Granted Blitzo gets that hammered in as Striker agrees with his denails because Striker is a suprmacist prick. He really was the perfect antagonist here: while crimson provides nice backing being the reason Striker did this plan and the resources to be an actaul threat and put forth a ransom demand, Striker does the heavy lifting, clearly hating both imps for being race traitors in his eyes and wanting both dead, NEARLY killing fizz simply for pissing him off.

Speaking of Ransom

This brings us to our b plot: Stolas , proving Blitz wrong with some dramatic irony, is having lunch with Ozy, wanting his help. We also get some more shading as Ozy rejects the idea of a love potion out right: he likes consent as much as he likes clown penis. Stolas however isn't a monster, and instead wants to give Blitzo a choice: he wants as asmodeon crystal, what the succubi use to travel since, for reasons we're not privy to yet, Ozy's one of the only ones allowed easy surface travel. Ozy rejects it: he WANTS to help but Fizz hates Blitzo for reasons he hasn't told his partner, and Ozy respects that, though he DOES sympathize.

Luckily for Ozy though stolas is there as Crimson springs his ransom plan.. which in hindsight is just... it...

Okay so Ransoming Fizzy.. ISN'T the dumb part. While it is fucking risky to ransom the lover of one of the 7 most powerful people in hell, we seen soon after Ozzy REALLY dosen't think clearly when Fizzy is in danger, and had Stolas not been there, he would've gladly blindly signed papers giving Crimson all his shit and allowing Crimson to kill fizzy.

The problem.. is Crimson is so damn smug he has no plan B, to a point i'm starting to think he's a fucking moron whose only been a threat because he has a LOT of resources and in his first apperance, still has an abusive hold on Moxxie. He shows his face, and while he dosen't say his name... not only am I sure one of the big bosses of hell itself can search for him by face.. CRIMSON PUTS HIS NAME ON THE CONTRACTS. This makes sense from a "I need to get his stuff" perspective, but not a "what happens if I somehow loose the clown" perspective. This isn't derailment as Crimson was just as short sighted with his last plan that assumed A) A notrious fuck up whose only assets are being hilarous and having a big dick wasn't lying to his face B) His son who ran away from him would do what he said and C) that the people he KNOWS are professional killers won't rescue moxxie in a pinch and will just die to his sloppy hitmen whose record so far in universe is 0 and 3 in actually killing anyone. 0 and 4 if the ones after Mimzy work for him, which they probably do, let's say 4 L's at this point. It works as Crim is mostly a threat due to his resources, and his vengeful impulsive personality both fits a mob boss, and makes him a good foil for his son/arch enemy: Moxxie overplans to the point of panic attacks, while Crimson underplans to the point his usually fall apart, not helped by him not understanding most people.

I'd also like to highlihgt one line I took at face value first two times around: Crimson calling Ozzie the "weakest of the sins". While it is possible Oz is the weakest... I forgot that hte person saying it is an overconfident jackass whose TRYING to underplay how powerful his opponent is. OF course he'd call Ozzie weak. Honestly, especially given the climax of our next episode, i don't think any power gaps within the sins are that huge until otherwise shown or stated: most of them are in the same boat of being so powerful in hell almost nothing else can really touch them: the only things above their league are Charlie, whose easily the nicest person in all of hell and won't fight unless pushed and this guy

Who likewise probably won't pummel you into the ground unless you piss him off bad, and the sins have known Lucifer long enough to know not to do that. I mean Mammon has plagerized him a lot and is still breathing. So while I do think Lucifer is a large reason for the stalemate, I also don't think he's naive enoguh to think the sins wouldn't start shit with one another subtly if they weren't just close enough in power to not backstab each other. They can posture, but a full on war would bring down the angelic fists of cuckining and no one wants that.

Thankfully for Ozzie though Stolas loves reading and is willing ot be his bird lawyer. Hoot hoot.

Thankfully for both of them though, Blitzo is plenty capable and while he makes a flashy dick of himself as usual, he DOES help fizz escape.

Eventually, as the two are dodging bullets, they can't dodge the issue and Fizzy finally explodes, revealing to the audience exactly WHY he hates blitzo and why they aren't friends these days.

So we get.. the fire. We find out on Fizz's birthday years ago Blitzo was going to confess, got upset seeing everyone else fawn over him and accidently set the place on fire and from Fizz's perspective ran the fuck away. As it turns out the white on Blitz's face, in a pretty stunning reveal honestly isn't some cool extra mark.. their burn scars, and the reason Fizzy is white faced.. is because he got it BAD. The cyborg arms weren't piece by piece replacing himself for fun and profit.. their necessary prosthetics. Fizzy lost everything he had that day: his home, his family, everything... and as BLitz tearfully reveals so did he as it's HEAVILY implied he ran to go save his mom.. and din't fail. I'd assume Blitz's dad died too but face it we're not that lucky.

This.. puts a lot into persective for Blitzo as a character and is part of why this episode is so great: We see WHY he hates himself so mucH: he lost his mom to an accident, lost his best friend who he was TRYING to confess to and his sister who blame him for it and .. well he' sprobably not lucky enough to loose his dad. Though when Cash DOES finally kick off hopefully loona will lift her dad up so he can dance on his casket. He los teverything and can't feel he deserves love as a result, while still DESPERATELY wanting it as seen with his constant stalking of m and m or how he treats Loona. The sad part is he dosen't even have to go that far: while they don't want to fuck him the m's do like and respect him and Loona does love him, she just had he rown issues to adress.

The good news about this trauma.. is it finally get the two over their trauma and to start reconcling. Before they can though they need a distractoin so we get look at this, a hilarious number that Fizz apparently used to sing to distract Blitzo's dad to so Blitz can steal booze and is here a flimsy escalating number as Fizz tries to distract. I also like how Fizz.. isn't a combatant. He's a performer and didn't have to learn to fight and has had the protection of two diffrent sins.. granted Mammon's "protection' isn't exactly healthy but more on that in a moment.

The two escape and collapse the warehouse crimson was using on him.. but Striker is still after them at this point just wanting pure vengance. I also love how not only does his "break you like a horse threat fail" predictbly on Blitzo but Fizz's suprised "your still on the horse thing?" There's just so much good banter between the two this episode, brightman and rogers have great chemistry.

While Fizz gets a new kink and Striker finally reaches his limit of his foes kinks, Blitzo saves fizz then saves him from fire this time, finally reconcling the two. Of course this being Blitzo he has to fuck it up by asking if they can make out but it's a start.

It's also a nice possible turning point for the series: i'ts early to call if this is just a one time thing or if Blitz will get the chance to do this more.. but it's the first time Blitz has been confronted with someone from his past.. and it hasn't blown up in his face. With Verosika he clearly hates her as much as she hates him and her smug attitude and treatment of Moxxie just cemented it, and with Barbie she didn't WANT to forgive him. With Fizz.. he WNATED to at least try again, the two just never had the chance. Someone kept Blitz from speaking to him. And now it's finished.. the two are buddies again. Blitzo HAS an honest to god friend whose also not working for him and who, one attempt aside, he isn't trying to bang and Fizzy has someone besides his partner to go to. They needed each other.. and now they have each other.

Wrapping up the rest Fizz returns, and Stolas leaves now his part in things (getting a better deal on the ransom Ozzie now dosen't have to pay), is done leaves Fizzy to get fucked.. after he and ozzie kill the lawyer who stupidly thinks he can run after this. The ending, like the start is a genuinely sweet moment from the two and shows off a neat other side to Ozzie: he's a mechanical genius, having designed the arms (Or at least the model Fizzy uses now) nad is th eone who repairs them for his lover any time they get hurt. While granted Ozzy also wants Fizzy to never leave again, Fizzy's fine with that given teh whole kidnapping and just as fine to share some kinks.. and to let Blitz have his crystal. He's more than earned it. A sweet ending to one of teh shows best.. an da good lead into our closing act tonight

MAMMONS MAGINFICENT MUSICAL MID-SEASON SPECIAL

So we've come ot the episode that clinched this idea for me and brotoman, one of the series best and at the time of this writing the latest episode. Will I do anothe rone of these in a year or two or follow up on other fizz episodes? Probably. But for now this is our grand finale and it delivers. While Helluva Boss slowly became a musical over it's run, likely inspired by viv doing the same to it's sister series, this is the episode that leans the heaviest into it: 4 songs, all bangers, and one big story.

It's also the shows' first stab at an episode focused on the series side cast. This reminds me most of the simpsons: While they aren't the only one to do this, Simpsons is famous for having a war chest of spotlight episodes focusing on the other characters. The simpsons are still involved but how much can range from Lisa's Date with Density, where Nelson is a main feature but Lisa is just as important, to A fish Called Selma, which focuses entirely on Selma and Troy McClure who you may remember from such episodes as Selma's choice, Lisa the vegetarian and Bart's Friend Falls in Love.

This one reminds me of the latter: Blitz is involved and is plot important, but he's not the focus. The episode's entirely on fizz and it's a larger gamble than you'd think: Fans love fizz and Alex Brightman gives a remakrable performance and showed last ep he more than had the range with this character to carry an episode, this both the second episode with only Blitzo in it out of IMP in a row, and in a season that, while I love it, does have it's pacing issues. So throwing down an episode about a popular side character was a risk.. but it's one that paid off gloriously. Clearly fans were hear for it as even people who don't like this season love this episode and i'm hoping it means Fizz will only show up more as we go.

So for the episode itself we start with a flashback

Fizz and Blitz are going to see teachers and it's here we get one of the best villians in the franchise so far and certainly one of the most hilaroius, MAMMON.

Mammon is our third sin and voiced by Smiling Friends and YOLO creator Micheal Cusak, a casting choice I didn't see coming, but is perfect. Not only does it help ease the gap till Smiling Friends and/or YOLO return, but his loud , boisterous australian style perfectly fits the loud, obnoxious mammon, with just enough subtely. He's like Krusty the Klown if he got the bad ending.

Mammon's intro is brilliant spending his time constantly spewing profanity, shilling to a crowd that spent every dime to get here, and promoting his next big thing: an annual clown pagent. It's like one of those fucked up beauty contests for kids but it's with clowns so IT'S BETTER. We also get a fuckton of great jokes from him taking a whole second to wlak back saying he'll exploit the winner, to saying women aren't funny as Viv's writing credit comes up, to my faviorite saying the winner will be like the son he's never had and Mammon will be like the stepdad who only loves you when it's convienent.

Mammon is also a departure as he's the first of the sins, and so far the only one of four, to be just.. straight up evil. All of them are mildly sketchy with Ozzy being a dick in public, Bee shoving cake in people's mouths and having a shitty adoptions system and Lucifer being incredibly neglectful until five minutes ago.. but all are at their cores decent people: Ozzy prioritzes consent and is a loving, caring supportive partner, Bee is both also a good partner and is a kind, vivacious person that dosen't want her patrons endulging just to hide their pain, is genuinely impressed to be drunk under the table, and her response to someone having a clear defenseive crush on her boyfriend.. is to borderline invite her to join, while my boy Lucifer had his dreams snapped in half and when called out on being a cyncial asshole, reveals PART of why he wasn't supportive of his kid was a worry the angels would fuck her up the same way they fucked him up, and when shown just HOW important her dreams are, backs her 100%, showing mercy to an enemy who dosen't deserve it when she asks, swooping in to save the day (if late for reasons i'm sure we'll learn later), and helping her get her spirit back up after a terrible loss. Each embodies their sin but they do so responsibly: Ozzy values consent, Bee values not using it as coping, and Lucifer is egotistical, but also uses that ego to help others and to help his daughter be proud of herself and what she's acomplished after she can't see it.

In contrast Mammon is every nasty thing about greed there is: he's selfish beyond all measure, wanting only what makes him money, cares nothing about the consequences, and will gladly exploit anyone who can make him money, throw htem out of they don't, and keep milking them dry till he's gotten every last dollar even if it kills them. He cares not one iota of a shit for the consequences of his actions as long as he gets paid. It's telling that while Lust is simply a red light district and sex toy making (and presumibly selling) mecca, Gluttony is a nicely apointed sky, and Pride is a luxiruous, if crime ridden, city... Greed is an industrial hell hole where toxic waste runs rampant and the crime seen in Pentagram City is dialed up to ungodly levels. Ozzie is neglectful like Lucifer.. but dosen't have Lucifer's excuse for it or eventaul comeback. He just dosen't care and never will.

The show, which we don't see in full end sup disapointing blitz, who isnt happy he spent his life savings to watch his idol vomit on stage and bury them in clowns, but Fizz BADLY wants that prize depsite Blitz's assurance he dosen't need it. We also meet Arick

Arick is an obessive stalker and it's very clear both from design and just how he's portrayed.. Viv's drawing from personal experince: Arrick comes up to fizz, gushes about how much he loves his work.. then talks about how they coudl work together ina very posseive and creepy way, how it could be bette rif he was involved and making Fizz very uncomfortable till Blitz tells him to fuck off.. and even then that dosne't completely stop him as he begs Fizzy to not make him go then turns on him when he understandably rejects the creepy guy whose been stalking him. Arrick's opinon shoudln't matter.. but dispaointing ANYONE clearly affects Fizz, something I can relate to: that drive to, even if someone's treating you like shit, make them care about you and want to make everyone love you. When... really not everyone's going to like you let alone love you and accepting that is healthy.

So we cut to a ways after with Mammon promoting robo Fizzy and how "YOU CAN FUCK HIM", and how Fizz got what he wanted.. but is clearly DEEPLY uncomfortable with semi sentient robot duplicates of himself creepy people can fuck.

So we finally get to the present: It's the clown pagent again and Fizz wins every year. It's also something Ozzy REALLY dosen't want him to do, as not only is it not necessary given his win streak and the amount of money he has.. but it's not healthy. in one of my faviorite lines all show Ozzy makes it clear he's known mammon a LONG time, since hell started, and knows just what a manipulative talentless prick he is, and he's somehow gotten worse , making nothing and explotiing others for money. "He can eat my ass. In a bad way. " It's clear from how much fizzy is stressing about a possible blemish and his weight that Ozzie is right.. but he also can't convince his boyfriend out of this. Fizzy NEEDS to do this.

So Ozzy calls for backup: since he both can't be there for publicty and since Fizzy only apparently has one friend, he calls Blitzo, whose milling around on a saturday afternoon, presumably watching reruns of "Yeah I Fucked Your Sister So What?". I love Blitz's reaction to ozzi'es call too calling him " your sin— Sinness? Sinfulness? Sin— [stammering] Ya royal, big man?" but still being casual. He's still Blitz, not bowing to standards.. but is still respectful, both knowing the gap between the two is wide.. and that Ozzie clearly deserves it as he clearly makes Fizz happy.

And being a good partner Ozzie is calling Fizz entirely because he CAN'T help Fizz with this: the pagent's bad for him, mammon is REALLY bad for him, but Fizz has also clearly heard this song and dance so many times it's become white noise to his crippling nisecurites, even with Ozzie correctly figuring out his partner hates the sex robots and the creepier fans they give. So Fitz needs someone to both protect him, and to get in his ear so he can get the strength to end this himself.

We also get a really nice touch as both previous times Blitzo's been asked to be a bodyguard, he was pissed, only accepting when Stoals offered to pay him monnneeeey and rejecting a possible repeat "it was a one time thing we did poorly". Here.. he agrees without a remote fight and while it could be because Ozzie simply won't take his shit like Stolas would it comes off more like he wants to: even if it's not on brand.. his friend needs him and when a friend's boyfriend asks for help you help him.

At the pagent Ozzie prepares to clear out, though Fizz pretty much sees through it, not calling ozzie out but finding it very weird he suddenly hired his best friend for security calling it "a little sus babe". It's also a nice moment as i'ts clear Fizz is annoyed at the transparent attempt to put someone they both trust on Fizz's shoulder for a situation Ozzie hates... but also gets on some level his boyfriend is just looking out for him and that Blitz being here isn't inherently harmful.

What is is Mammon who right away questions fizzy's weight while needling him with doubts he could win, hoping he does "You won't let me down right". And this part.. shows range with Cusak I didn't know he had. Don't get me wrong he's brilliant in both Smiling Friends and Yolo... but usually when he's creepy there it's loud and acomplanied with nightmarish animation. Here he takes a character whose loud as hell.. and has him get quiet and manipulative. Just the tone he takes SOUNDS concerned.. but you can just feel the manipulation coming off it, something anyone who isn't his victim could see... but easily works on Fizz. It's something tons of performers have gone through and heartbreakingly so, and something that's just.. chillingly realistic. It's one of the creepeist moment sin the franchise.. just how CASUAL mammon is with ita nd how much he's clearly done it.

Blitzo is here this time and not only stops the fucker but calls him out. This is another nice subtle thing I didn't notice my first few times watching this one but sunk in on binge watching the series through again: Blitzo.. has met all three sins introduced on this show thus far, and thus we get a nice range of his reactoins: with Bee he treats her like anyone else, which fits as she treats everyone equally and is fairly down to earth and observant, if still just insulated enough to miss some cues here and there. With Ozzie he's also casual, but more respectful, trying to give him a title and being honest with him. He respects Ozzie enough for titles, but is still himself with the guy as he clearly has learned to trust the royal big man, or at least trust what he and fizz has is 100% real.

With Mammon... he's confrontational.. but only because he DOSEN'T respect him: Mammon could end his ass righ tthen and there.. and he dosen't give a fuck. he's a terrible performer, an abusive prick and deep down blitzo knows he's not stupid enough to threaten what image he has left by killing someone in a large crowd.. I mean I asssume every sin has done this, but doing so because some guy talked shit about you to protect his friend isn't great optics.

We then meet the twins, Glitz and Glam played by Faye Mata of Miraculous Ladybug Fame. Yes those of you who have also suffered through that monolith of a show, WE GOT ANOTHER ONE. Sinners rejoice. The two are catty, insulting fizzy right away and not even getting laong too well, your standard contest episode heels. Also credit to the episode it's easy to tell them apart both by personality and appearnce; Glitiz is the manic one with mask like fins ove rher eyes, and glam is the more reserved one next to her. Naturally Blitz wants Fizzy to "piledrive those sluts" on principal now.

We get our first song next, Juggling iz Cool, by a guest performer near and dear to my heart, Austrlian singer, Tik Tokker/ youtuber (I use the latter, the former I mostly avoid), and mustache man Tom Cardy, a comedy singer with a great libary form songs that use "Human centpede: as a chorus , to painting ladies to toally not avoid sex, to planet metaphors to help you discover your self worth, to one of my faviorites Jurassic Park 10: it's dino time, where Tom accurately sums up the jurassic park movies while sick and possibly high on cough medicine, then creates his own ones giving us the now iconic line "I should not have given my robot dinosaur a penis, because like anything with a penis it's going to want to use its penis" said as if he's mildly drunk on cough syrup. His music is impeciable as his song topics can be utterly insane. Give him a listen.

Juggling is cool is a nicely tense tune showing just how much pressure fizz is on as Tom narates the contest, nicely conveying the tension the poor guy is feeling as the Twins easily equal him. What i laso like is that while the twins are jerks... their GENUINELY good. They have talent, even setting themselves on fire, and easily equal Fizz and despite their arguments pre show are perfectly in sink.

It also works because ultimately the contest.. dosen't matter. Fizz WANTS to win and we want him to win.. but th ereal conflict isn't "will fizz win or not" but... "SHOULD he keep doing this or not". He's got a supportive boyfriend who will support him emotinally and finacially, he's got enough fame to do whatever the fuck he wants next. Fizz attributes everything he has to Mammon.. but Mammon was simply the right opportunist in the right time. The talent's all Fizzy.. the explotation's all mammon. Even when Fizzy wants something resonable as a break instea dof doing a singing, Mammon guitls him into it.

Granted.. Fizzy IS really good at interacting with his fans and it's clear while assholes like Arick plauge viv regularly, as they do any celebreity sadly, this scene gives us the impression there's been plenty of GOOD fan reactions to counter act that, as Fizzy eagerly plays the crowd and we get one of the standout scenes of the episode when he talks asl with a young fan. It's a nice little bit that shows while a lot of his fandom are exausting.. Fizzy GENUINELY loves his fans and to interact with them. His love of performing is there: we saw it at ozzies. He loves playing a crowd. It's just exausting when parts of those crowd don't see you as a human being.

Speaking of which Arrick returns, calling out fizzie.. .and a creepy fantasy of Fizzy on a leash in a gimp suit makes it clear just what his "love" means. Nothing wrong with bondage, after all..

But it's clear Viv likes using leashes as a symbol of toxic relationships, seen by the chain leash that can be summoned by contracts in hazbin, the chains blitzo saw in his halluciintion in truth seeker and this one here.

Arick isn't as lucky this time as Blitz is now less a teenage dirtbag baby and instead an experinced assasian not affraid to blow his head up in front of a bunch of children. Arick backs off.. for now but it's clear the encounter rattled poor Fizzy and rather than show actual sympathy Mammon once again fakes it.. but glares to make it clear he expects him to perform.

He does "agree" to put the twins on first but it's once again a manipulation tactic. It's what makes mammon so unsettling here: every move to fizz is just another form of gaslighting and you can see the strings... but Fizzy either can't.. or has simply internalized them.

So with this we get Klown Bitch, a true banger of a song, performed by Allison Kaplan subbing in for Glam and Faye Mata still rocking glitz. THe result is a sexy, well done pop number that sums up the duo, their using sex to sell things, and their talent as the harmonies are just delcious. The lighting is also aweosme, being blue, shifting to a purple for Glitz' rapid fire rap solo, and highlithing the two, while mimicing biolumensince. And i'll admit some bias: I like fish women and I like siren songs. But i'm not SO horny that I can't see great production value, killer singing, and god tier animation for what it is, and what it is is excellent. This is easily one of the best looking bits of the series so far.. and only isn't best... because of what's to come.

So naturally a number this good leaves Fizzy having a nervous breakdown since mammon's too busy on his throne to gaslight him out of it this time. Blitz has done what he can, planting the seeds of doubt that Fizzy REALLY needs mammon, even if he's trying not to listen... but ultimately he's simply not who his best friend needs nor the guy to give a heartfelt pep talk. I mean I think he has it in him but it'd take a lot to get him there and Fizzy dosen't have tha tkind of time.

So instead Blitzo summons Ozzie, who despite not being in the crowd.. INSTANTLY teleports to his lovers side. No risk of their relationship being revealed for what it is is worth Fizzy's pain.

Ozzy is FINALLY able to draw out why Fizzaroli is having a panic attack.. he's worried he's not good enough. The pagent is an annual reinforcment that he deserves everything he has and the poor clown feels if he looses it he'll loose it all: that if he can't PROVE he's talented, prove he's the best, prove himself he'll loose Ozzie. Despite having come far, gotten everything Blitzo wanted.. he still has every bit the self loathing his bestie does, just channeled diffrentlY: Blitzo channels his into self destructive bullshit, pushing people away before he assumes he'll loose them, while Fizz goes the opposite route: instead of pushing what he loves away, he works himself to near death to keep something he was never going to loose. Both are deeply unhealthy, ones just easier to see. It's why Ozzie hasn't been able to get through to him: Fizz wasn't honest with the real reason.. or his body dismorphia, utterly hating his burned broken horns underneath his neat hat.

Thankfully Ozzie finds a way around this by both pointing out WHY he loves him.. and exactly what he finally needed to hear.

"Fizz, Mammon didn't do shit. You already were this. You'd be this no matter what! You are the most inspiring demon I have ever known, and meeting you was the best thing that ever happened to me. I adore your inventiveness, your attitude, your resilience. Aaaaand you're just the cutest little thing alive. *nuzzles Fizz's cheek* Also, you are a waaaay better performer than Mammon ever was, and thaaat's just facts."

It's what Fizz needed and what those of us with a lot of sel floathing need; someone telling you ou don't suck, you've earned what you got, and your a good person.

To hammer this in we get our penultimate number, crooked.

Crooked is a song that has reallyg rown on me since last time I saw it. It's a fantastic song, but it's sandwitched between "two minutes of watery fanservice" and "a glorious triumphant fuck you to someone who defintely deserve it", It's a great song, but it's sandwitched between two other great songs that have a slightly memorable presentation.

Crooked by contrast is a simple r n b love ballad.. but damn if it isn't adorable. James Monroe Engleheart once again gets to flex his voice but this time instead of a grandose display of lust, it's a tender display of love. It's a beautiful song where Ozzie gently shoots down Fizzy's self doubt pointing out he's not wasting his time, he's got nothing but it, and that there's so much in Fizzy he can't see. I'ts sweet and the oh oh oh's are just.. such a godo touch, being both sexual and romantic and just perfect.

Naturally after this tender display, we get.. Arrick who bursts in with a knife

Thankfully Blitz blows his head off SECONDS after he enters and clearly heard the whole thing, congradulating the two on being fucking hyocprites, someting warrnated, welle arned.. but also clearly in good nature: he won't hestiate to needle them about how many airs they put on about just beign sexual.. but he gets they need each other.

So with this we transition directly into our final number. I wans't kidding abotu the sadnwtiched things. There isn't all that much between Crooked and two minutes notice.

So .. there's no easy way to say this.. Two Minutes NOtice.. is the best sequence in the series so far. It's gorgeously animated, packed with tiny details, beautifully caps off the episodes themes, and has the series best song by far. And both as the best sequence in the show and the best musical number it has a LOT of competittion that it just.. blows out of the water.

There's just so much expressivness in Fizzy's movement, so many fluid and fun moves, even the little things like how he lights a match on his own arms to spell out fuck you in the sky or his big smile while doing his acrobatics during the first chorus. It's a joyous celebration that shows just how.. LIBERATING this fuck you is to Fizz, after years of eeling like he needs mammon.. he now knows what and thus spends two minutes+ telling him to eat shit.

What also sells it is story wise.. it's a fucking perfect parallel to the oepning: mammon gave his hordes of fans a half assed show promoting other shit he was doing and apparently vomiting on stage. Fizzy, fresh off both a panic attack AND a stalker barging in and seeing said stalkers brains go out, without any time to really prepare, IMPROVISES a routine that' sincredibly acrobatic, has tons of extra stunts packed in he does effortlessly from the fire writing to the now iconic riding on the ball bit to slapping his own ass (And Ozzie hiding his erection is just.. pricless. And somehow adorable. Never has hiding your boner been this sweet), all with a charm and charismA. We'd seen enough of Fizzy to know he's a talented performer.. but this shows EVERYTHING he has laid on the table to give his fans one final farewell for now. He could've half assed it or even jus topened with quitting.. but he cared enough to put on one hell of a show to end this chapter in his career. The love of his fans was clear before, but little bits like him going into the crod to interact iwth them or telling the deaf fan from earlier thank you... it's very clear this man didn't want to let them down. He's not doing the show for Mammon.. he's doing it for them and he's doing it for himself.

The song is also just great, a fantastic beat, Sam haft outddid himself, and Brightman's vocals at their absolute best. The show's going to hav ea HARD time topping this and it's okay if it dosen't.

So Mammon.. didn't really get the point till Fizzy, post song, thanks all his fans before quitting. And once he does. .he's fucking furious, angrily shouting at Fizzy, dropping the illusion of kindness and jus straigh tup lapsing into abuse. And Fizzy.. just flips him off. Mammon lost his power over him the second he stopped letting him have it. It's telling who has the real power in this conversation when MAMMON resorts to his full form, a giant spide rmonster form it and scremaing at Fizzy with the voice of the legion. It's genuinely terrifying and Micheal Cusak does a great job making this throughly silly monster into a regular one once again.

Unfortuantely for him.. it's just.. not working. Fizzy has zero fear of Mammon. evne if he kills him.. all Mammon has done is insure no one is going to want to actually work for him unless their really that desperate. I mean there are people that desperate but it's still a pretty big gamble.

Thankfully before Mammon can shout some more or do some spider shit, Ozzy steps in, having already been ready to the moment Mammon made the mistkae of going full spider.. and naturally Ozzie has the cooler form, his normal form but with a crimson middle head and his two other heads now fully manifested. How he does it is also awesome, standing behind fizz like h'es his fucking stand, fully bared.

Mammon.. isn't thereanted, planning to use the old chesnut that's hung over the two since the start; revelaing thir relationship. Problem is, and in a nice subtle arc.. it's clear the dyas events have finally hamered it in for Ozzie that who knows about thema nd who dosen't.. dosen't fucking matter. He loves Fizzy, Fizzy loves him, and he's finally ready to shout it, with Fizzy being genuinelys hcoked when Ozz says he dosen't care.. and even more when eh reveals it to a crowd

"What that I lvoe him, well I do"

And the crowd.. goes apeshit for it, complete with the hilarous guy with a three phone duel disk and Mammons' response is a hilarously subdued "oi, ya dirty bitch". He tells Ozzie he'll regret this, and he probably has some evil shit planned... but for now Mammon.. ha slost. Fizzy has his freedom, he and Ozzie can be pub lic damn the consequences. It's the perfect capper to a perfect episode.

For now the members of the crowd mammon didn't kill are happy, our heroes are happy.. and Blitz wants to know who tops.

So yeah.. I love this episode... adn it made me truly love this character, it's gorgeously done and damn i't sgood.

Overally Fizz... has a strong arc, one built with small hints at first but then hitting full tilt with what's essentially a two parter. I was happy to cover him and i'll be happy to cover this unvierse again any time. Thanks for reading and happy almost valnetine's day.

[recurring-polynya]

Ok stupid ask but like how do you think the story of ichigo and his friends will be perceived in like the soul reaper/ academy, ichihime and renruki parts of it as well….because like those 4 have to be in the history books by now right?.

I don't think it's a stupid question at all! The nature of history and remembrance in Soul Society is actually one of my favorite things to talk about.

What I love about Soul Society is that it's ancient and continuous and time is sort of made up in the sense that you can have two people who are 900 years old and one looks like a teen and the other looks 90. It's sort of immune to a lot of the historical events and trends that create distinct eras in the World of the Living, things just sort of mash together instead, like a garage where you keep throwing stuff. You might think that they care very deeply about record-keeping and history, but in fact, it is an afterlife. There is such a natural tendency toward forgetting and revisionism. There are archives, but they are difficult to traverse and have a tendency to eat information rather than retain it. Probably the number one source of actual information about the Soul Society in canon Bleach is the shady guy who got kicked out and runs a candy store in the Living World. (Does anyone else think constantly about how Rukia didn't know what a Quincy was before she met Uryuu??)

So onto the question of Ichigo and his legacy. One thing to keep in mind is that while Ichigo and his nakama have done a tremendous service to Soul Society, telling those stories truthfully does not exactly paint anyone in the Seireitei power structure in a particularly good light. In fact, just about every good thing Ichigo ever did would have been completely unnecessary if the Gotei 13 could find its ass with both hands and a flashlight.

What parts of the Soul Society Arc, for example, would Soul Society consider worthy of enshrining in a text book, for the edification of future shinigami? Well, there was Aizen's betrayal, of course, which would need to be a cautionary tale. Soul Society loves to heap blame on people, heaping blame is fun, so there would probably be significant page count devoted to how evil and corrupt Aizen was, detailing his horrible deeds. You definitely don't want any young people coming to their own conclusions about Aizen or any of the points he was trying to make. Now we, the readers know that this came to light because of Ichigo storming the Seireitei, but he wasn't the one who discovered the bodies or uncovered the conspiracy, was he? No, that was Captains Hitsugaya and Unohana. I'm not sure they would necessarily merit a mention either. I feel like Soul Society history texts are very fond of the passive voice. "The bodies were discovered." When you think about it, even as it's happening, Ichigo is erased from the narrative of Rukia's execution. My memory of it was that her specific crimes were (1) staying in the Human World too long and (2) giving her powers to a human, but when I tried to look up all the places in the manga where I expected her crimes to be spelled out, it was just like "for your crimes." I think if you asked a good half the captains what she was being executed for, they wouldn't be able to answer. Further, Soul Society couldn't have cared all that much about (2) given that Byakuya just left Ichigo for dead without even checking for a pulse or anything, and I'm not sure anyone (aside from Renji and Byakuya, who didn't seem to care) made the connection that the ryouka coming to rescue Rukia was the same human she gave her powers to. There isn't even a tendency to list Ichigo and his friends by name. They are simply the ryouka, which, as Yoruichi points out is the same thing they call anyone who makes trouble in Soul Society.

If you aren't familiar with it, Color Bleach+ is sort of a databook, but it's really half omake comics and the conceit of the other half is that it's the special edition of the Seireitei Communication that was published after ryouka invasion, the issue Shuuhei is passing out to Ukitake while Rukia and Orihime are training together [Note: It is wonderful and hilarious and I recommend that everyone buy a copy, it is my prized possession]. Overall, it's a pretty lighthearted book and not meant to be taken seriously, but I do want to point out that the Seireitei Comm absolutely paints Ichigo and the gang as Serious Criminals, whose motivations are unknowable and sinister. I mean, look at the entry on Orihime, the most precious flower in the universe:

Her offenses are odious.

In other words, we're not starting out well here, but Ichigo is the one who defeats Aizen, right? And he saves the Soul Society from the Quincy War, right?

Well, you and I know that's true, of course, but if you were writing a history book, think about all the other stuff that was going on. Moving Karakura Town to Soul Society and vice versa! Guarding pillars! The Head Captain releasing his sword! I feel like it would be very easy to fill up a lot of text book space with troop movements and Central 46 debates, and to really gloss over the unflattering fact that Soul Society had to rely on the kindness of some kid that they had no actual control over to save their bacon.

But everyone knew him, right? Surely, people would talk about his deeds, right? Well, maybe. For starters, how many shinigami really do know him? The filler arcs tend to make it seem like Ichigo is pals with most of the captain class, but I think that's pretty exaggerated. Obviously, Renji and Rukia know the whole Karakura gang well. The Advance Team lived in Karakura for a month, except that Ichigo, Uryuu and then Orihime all made themselves scarce during that time, and I'm not even sure how much, say, Captain Hitsugaya got to know Chad. Obviously, Byakuya, Kenpachi, and Yachiru, and Ukitake know Ichigo decently well. Chad taught Shuuhei to play the guitar. Orihime and Rangiku are close. But for most of the other captains/vice-captains, they may know about the events that happened, but only second-hand. And also, how much do the rank-and-file troops socialize with these folks? Also, a ton of shinigami died in the war. Just a metric assload. According to We Do (Knot) Always Love You, half the Gotei was lost and two-thirds of the Academy instructors. There was a huge recruiting and rebuilding effort afterwards, and we see that ten years later, things are starting to get back to normal, but at this point, there's a lot of new people who simply weren't there.

So here's my take on it. I think Ichigo et al's contributions are greatly diminished in the official texts. I think that most of the decisions and actions that were taken was attributed to Yamamoto (or later Kyouraku) and the Central 46 (even when they did nothing). The captains probably get about the right amount of credit. The vice-captains get about 1/10 of the credit they deserve. Kurosaki Ichigo and his pals are a footnote.

That being said, the guys still exists. Most people who serve in Squad 13 have probably seen him walking around and said hi to him and have probably seen him spar with their captain or her husband, likewise Squad 11, and know that this guy is for real and that his power level is horrifying, even when he's just goofing around with his pals. I think he takes on sort of a cryptid state actually: everyone knows he was a real guy who was involved to some degree in the wars, but was he really a human-shinigami-Hollow-Quincy hybrid? Sounds fake to me. Lost son of the banished clan? If you say so. I think there are a ton of Kurosaki Ichigo stories, and some are very real and some are very fake and I think after a few dozen years, it's hard to remember which are which, even for the people who were there. His friends likewise take on slightly legendary status: Orihime, his beautiful and kind lady-love with her otherworldly healing gifts. Chad, his lion-hearted, faithful companion, of unparalleled physical strength. And of course, Uryuu, Ichigo's narrative foil, brought back from the side of evil by their bonds of companionship. It really does have the ring of a folktale, doesn't it?

70 or 80 years from current time, when Ichigo makes the permanent move to Soul Society, I feel like he's going to introduce himself and people will be like "Oh, you must have been named after the Great Hero of Soul Society, eh? There were three Kurosaki Ichigos in my middle school" and Ichigo is just like "yes, that's it exactly."

You mentioned Rukia and Renji, and of course, they are there and exist, with all the concomitant weirdness that shinigami captains who don't hold themselves completely apart from normal people have. Ukitake was thousands of years old, and on one hand, he liked to send everyone he knew cardso on their birthdays, but on the other, I feel like sometimes he would drop some casual allusion to how much work there was during the smallpox epidemic of 735, or perhaps mention one of the dozens of times he had to face down some ultra-powerful opponent who would have collapsed all of reality, except he can't actually remember the guy's name, there have been so many. Renji and Rukia are very very young in comparison, but I feel like they are very much on their way to becoming that guy. They have seen some shit. I think Renji, in particular, will be running a drill and launch into some aside about the time he killed 17 Menos who happened to be standing in a row in the Forest of Menos in the depths of Hueco Mundo, back when he had his worse bankai, anyway, guys, don't line up like that, it makes you vulnerable. Hey, is it lunchtime yet? It's not necessarily that no one believes the stories they tell, it's that the stories they tell are simply unbelievable. Unreconcilable with your daily experience. They're heroes of the Winter War and the Thousand-Year Blood War, because of course there are, but there will surely be more wars and more dimensional collapses and more Valleys of Screams and at some point, they're just Old Shinigami Captains, because that's just what you turn into if you manage to not die enough times.

I think there actually is one accurate account of the Karakura Kids' contributions to Soul Society and that only exists because it is the duty of the Kuchiki to compile and guard the history of Soul Society and Byakuya is autistic enough to want to record the actual truth and not the official version. Rukia and Renji actually wrote down most of it, and then Byakuya translated it into over-flowery, formal academic language, and it sits on a shelf in his library somewhere, gathering dust. In case someone ever wanted to read it.

[letitrainathousandflames]

goth counter culture was your thesis??? do tell. thats so metal my dude do tell please I need the facts and information.

(not me reading tags because Im curious)

*flails excitedly* aaaah yes I have a degree in Fashion Design and Goth subculture (with an emphasis on its fashion aspect, of course) was the focus of my thesis. I'll go on into the fashion aspect bc otherwise this post will be gigantic <3

Subcultures are SO cool because they resist to the pull of the mass culture. They are where aesthetic, fashion, ideology, art, politics and more meet and create entire movements that refuse to conform and be blended into what is deemed Normal and Acceptable.

Punk and Goth are two amazing examples of movements that go against what fast fashion and consumerism culture dictates.

Punk fashion looks cooler the more worn and frayed by use each piece is. Stains and holes in the fabric are irrelevant, poems and art is scribbled with markers on the jeans of pants and canvas of shoes, all those chains and spikes on belts and bracelets are bound to yank or rip at a seam here and there and no one cares.

Punk got that jacket at a second hand shop twelve years ago and has been covering it on patches and song lyrics and they will not bat an eye at some pre-ripped, pre-frayed, overpriced jacket because there are twenty of them that look exactly like it on the same rack and they all lack soul and history.

Any Forever 21's pre-made "punk" jacket with false pockets and perfectly symmetric frayed ends will never have what an old-school haphazardly patched and scribbled jacket where one's hands can sink past the wrists in its pockets have.

Similarly, Goth fashion is contrary to fast-paced consumerism culture in the sense that it rejects the concept of trends and of certain styles/colors/accessories/etc being "in" or "out".

That does not mean that Goths are cheap, though! A high-quality, sturdy corset can cost about $120, more if it's made to measure, and one will be happy to buy it because it's a staple piece that can be matched with most of a goth's wardrobe and will last decades if properly taken care of.

An interesting point about the complete disregard for Autumn/Winter or Spring/Summer and the whole "oh I can't wear this, it's so last season!" is the fact that most goth shops - many of which sell handmade fashion - sell the same pieces in and out of seasons.

If a classic, Wednesday Addam-esque black dress with white lacy collar and underskirt for volume works and is selling well, why ditch the design at the end of some arbitrarily created period of time? Why stop selling pieces that work and are good just because you theoretically can't sell sleeveless dresses during winter?

Another aspect is that, if everything you own is mostly black, you'll hardly have issues matching pieces together, and if you love a particular dress or jacket too dearly and they are in good state but their color has been washed into a pale grey, you can always have them re-dyed back into their original raven-like glory.

Needless to say, fast-fashion wear-it-and-discard-it-in-a-year people are... not very fond of such subcultures and their refusal to renovate their wardrobes every goddamn year.

In my course of studies, we go through two evaluating processes for our thesis: one at the writing, data-gathering, book-quoting phase; and another one at the debating, using what was studied as a base, creating your fashion collection phase.

I had to defend my thesis twice, and I would be failed a third time if my favorite teacher who really liked my work hadn't infiltrated the evaluating border while pretending not to know me and gave me a score high enough to pass to the next phase despite the other teachers' low score.

Because those teachers really really hated that I had picked a target audience that demanded quality over quantity and were mostly immune to the market's pressures as the focus of my study. They wanted me to do like 17 out of the 19 other students in my class and just do beachwear instead.

Y'know, because "this is Brazil, and why are you picking such a complicated topic like Goths and how they need breathable, lighter fabrics here because the U.S. and British brands usually makes clothes in warmer fabrics so buying clothes online isn't really a solution..."

(these are the same people who told the girl who wanted to make clothes for tattooed, female bodybuilders that her target audience didn't exist, and I had turn to her and loudly say that I knew a female bodybuilder, and she could easily get her in touch with others for her research. Oh. I think I just traced back to why those teachers might hate me. Oops lmao)

Anyway I passed to phase 2, had a blast working on my designs with my fav teacher as my guide, and even though I'm seeking out a career path more focused on art rather than fashion, I'm really proud of how it turned out.

That thesis was my baby and I think both passion and spite were my fuel to make it <3

[fils91]

"The End of Obesity" Review

I was not expecting a solid special. After the debacle that was "Not Suitable for Children", this was a complete breath of fresh air.

I've been learn something new from this show lately because I don't access to cable TV. Hearing about Opazoid was interesting. I looked it up and it works for people with obesity and diabetes. Specifically, type 2 diabetes. Looks like I'm shit out of luck, since I have type 1 diabetes. And I have been trying like Cartman to lose weight to no success. I'm not obese like him, so again, no dice for me.

Aaaand Kenny dies because it's been a long time since that happened. At this point, that running gag should die out already since I don't think anybody noticed that it's rarely been used anymore.

The ability for Cartman to insult people if he were thin and not having their weight criticized is of course par for the course with him. Looks like Pakistan is cancelling South Park and Kyle now has to be drawn with freckles.

The trend of wearing midriffs by women who use Opazoid (and of course middle/high school girls because fashion never seems to change)... looks like we're in for fanarts of the SP moms like that.

And, as you guessed, Randy takes part because Opazoid is technically drugs. But way different types of drugs as he would go on to find out. Oh, and Towelie has returned.

As for the Lizzo medication... shit did not come out of my ears, and as I already stated, have type 1 diabetes. Guess I'm immune to Lizzo. Take that, T&M.

The commentary on America's health care system making it quite difficult to get things done when it comes to your health is accurate.

Oh, and one more thing. The subplot with the cereal mascots. I'm barely high and I feel like I'm really high because wtf?!

In conclusion, this was a good special. Now we need to wait until possibly September for S27 to start, capping off with another special that I know for a fact will be about this year's election, which T&M will probably make the week the results are in so that they won't inadvertently fuck up like they did back in 2016.

Since it's 4AM, I need to rest now.

[eyedelater]

i have written a post to encompass every thought i have had about the golden kamuy character ogata hyakunosuke. i couldn't help writing it, and here it is. it includes analysis, interpretation, confusion, thoughts about shipping, and spoilers all the way to the end of the manga.

the post is incredibly long because i wanted it all in one place... i'm sure that much of this has been said by other people, but i haven't read anything anyone else has said. this is purely between me and canon. i have now read golden kamuy through twice and watched the anime once. i missed a lot on the first read, and i probably missed some things on the second read too.

i can't help but love the character ogata hyakunosuke. i know a lot of it is the character design: sneaky eyes with built-in eyeliner, greasy all-back hairstyle with a powerful ahoge (and don't try to tell me an ahoge is not what it is), little beard that somehow skirts past my strong dislike for nasty little beards. he's so crafty… he's sorta weak in close combat… he's completely wrong about things such as killing one's parents and the nature of guilt… he's confident right up until he isn't…

normally if a character captures my interest like this, i want to ship them with another character so i can be satisfied by looking at amusing fanart of them outside of canon. but there honestly isn't anyone i want to pair him with… the fact of his eventual death notwithstanding. (i don't ship dead characters. too sad.) he's great as a cruel and calculating loner who thinks he knows what he wants but doesn't. i don't feel a need to see fun and exciting shipping antics with this character in particular. i will to look at some fanart to see what i can get out of it, but i'm really satisfied by just what happens in canon. and yet i still feel like i have to make sense of these feelings, so i'm writing a post that nobody asked for (just like all my other posts).

i'm annoyed with myself because as i was first reading golden kamuy, it took a long, long time to dawn on me that there MUST be people who think of ogata hyakunosuke as their favorite silly little cinnamon roll and make obnoxiously cute posts about what he would do in domestic situations and stuff. as we learned more about him, i became certain that some people must feel that way, Despite Everything. and i was so very annoyed by the thought of it that i decided to make it a point to dislike ogata… to buck the trend. to avoid biting the fandom bait. BUT IT DIDN'T WORK………… he grew on me… ugh. i still really, really don't want to see fluffy fics with him or anything like that though. god. i have less patience than ever for fandom content that cutesifies every character. especially fucked up weird horrible men like him <3

it's an incredibly audacious move to create a merciless sniper character who killed three (3) members of his closest family (and who knows how many soldiers) and then also give him explicitly catlike characteristics and behaviors, all the while knowing that everyone loves cats!!! (slams table.) fuck off! noda-sensei had to have been trying to induce brain-melting levels of cognitive dissonance in the minds of horny readers who desperately want catboy hyakunosuke to be their poor little meow meow but also want to cancel him for being a bad dude. i'm not immune

i like ogata in kind of the same way i like crocodile one piece. they're weird and smug and fun to watch. and of course, they're similar in some ways. the greasy all-back hair with pieces falling down, and the facial stitches, and the excessive confidence, and their voice actors being perfect. and, you know, the being villains who are eventually defeated. crocodile lets out his slow laugh whenever he feels things are going his way, and ogata just does a little shit-eating grin, and they're both perfect. key difference: ogata gets naked

i have been made aware that a non-zero amount of people ship ogata with asirpa, and those people might benefit from being run over by a car. asirpa is excluded from shipping of any sort, no exceptions, because she is 13 years old and 95% of the other characters are (bizarre, horrible) adult men. the fact that she has a one-sided crush on sugimoto for some amount of time is perfectly natural and reasonable given the circumstances (i believe that anyone would fall in love with sugimoto if they were in her place). the relationship between sugimoto and asirpa is that of a wonderful, wholesome, and strong found family.

back to ogata. i liked that during his first appearance, he gets his arm broken, gets beaned on the back of the head with his own gun, falls into a ravine, hits his face on a cliff, and bounces off the cliff into the icy river. that was so early in the story that his character design wasn't even nailed down yet, and that scene can be easy to forget, but it should be remembered. i like when ogata gets shot in the chest and the shoulder. i like when we get just a little snapshot of ogata knocked out cold at the stenka. i like the flashback of masked ogata getting his face bloodied by teen koito and then having to pretend like it never happened even though he's pissed. i like when ogata gets the snot beat out of him by usami. this is not a toga-himiko-like aesthetic preference for a man's bloody and beat-up body. rather, i love how he has strong (and justified) confidence in his one skill (sniping) and therefore seems confident overall but keeps getting busted up anyway because he's weak in close combat. it's a good dissonance.

i love seeing ogata smugly perched on things… it's like, "ah, there he is…!"

i love ogata feeling guilty about only the worst murder he committed and none of the others… he was testing his limits, and he found them. it didn't stop him from killing again, but he never got over it either.

i love ogata being the only one who chose not to hold hands and jump at the beach scene… doesn't want to make a fool of himself… but he made a funny face when he got beaned in the back of the head, didn't he. i like the ogata who gets made a fool out of.

after the ordeal with anehata shiton, ogata said that all men feel regretful and disgusted after they shoot their load. probably that's all he's ever felt, doing it with prostitutes and such, if at all. makes a little note in my notebook

ogata does terribly cruel things, and he must recognize to some degree that people will see his actions as cruel, but he doesn't do it for the sake of being cruel. he is heartless, but only when he feels he has a reason. everything is analyzed based purely on how it will affect him, and he acts that way consistently throughout the entire story. he can mime kindness if he has to, but clumsily. he cultivates a trusting relationship with asirpa purely because he understands that nopperabou is her father. he goes along with what sugimoto wants purely for convenience and because he understands how strong/dangerous sugimoto is. he shoots wilk, despite knowing that he is asirpa's father and that she will be very upset, purely because he wants to limit the spread of whatever information wilk has about the gold. he shoots sugimoto, his ally for months, not to be cruel, not as revenge for almost killing him that one time, but to eliminate a potential complication to his plan. the only one he really needs in his party is asirpa, and all asirpa is to him is the key to the gold, and all the gold is to him is a path to climb the ranks to prove that his father was worthless. his behavior is unpredictable on first read, but when rereading, it's incredibly consistent. his lack of guilt is entirely premised on what he can justify to himself, and he's great at justifying anything in his own mind. but there is a limit, and yuusaku was that limit; what haunts him most about yuusaku's death is that this time, he can't justify it. he didn't have a good reason. that causes a crack in the foundation of his entire personality, and when he gets acute aconite poisoning from asirpa's arrow, the anxiety it brings is what causes that crack to spread and his entire ego to collapse.

can someone count how many panels feature ogata's face and then also count how many of those panels show him smoothing back his greasy hair and give me some kind of ratio? i think it's high. i think the ratio is high. though i didn't notice until a couple hundred chapters in. but on reread it's like yeah, every other ogata panel, he's got his hand on his head. i do like when an author commits to a tic. no one else in the story has such an obvious repeating tic, i think. he even gets a nade nade (pet pet) sound effect when he's smoothing his hair repeatedly out of nervousness (after he shot the reindeer by accident).

have i mentioned i hate nasty little beards but ogata's slides right in under the gate? that's another cognitive dissonance for me, and it's tough. hard to get over this one.

"daily affirmations i Can be normal about that man"

~quote from deleted post by a tumblr user who maybe doesn't want credit bc they deleted their post

he dishes out smug grins when things are going his way, but he dishes out WRY grins when things AREN'T going his way! hoargh! (throwing up hands)

it's worth noting, to defend my honor, that ogata is not the only one who grew on me. everyone grew on me. another important one is tsukishima, who i admit i wasn't paying very much attention to until they started heading toward karafuto (during the first reading) and then i was like, that was the guy in the coal mine... right? oh, he's been there The Whole Time. and his design didn't change very much. he grew on me a lot. first you think snake nose, but then you think bunny nose. (someone on pixiv said gorilla nose? i don't like that…) his little beard doesn't strike me as nasty either (why not?? i don't know.) of course, koito was the boy of the hour as soon as he first appeared, and i paid a normal amount of attention to him. (the only part of his design that changed is that his eyebrows got stronger and his parted hair got fixed. actually his part seems to fluctuate between messy and neat.) i really like the dynamic of koito being a needy younger pain-in-the-ass to tsukishima while outranking him and being taller than him. in japanese, tsukishima always addresses him with polite speech, and koito rarely even addresses tsukishima with an honorific. tsukikoi seems to be a good and semi-wholesome ship… you know, semi-wholesome. listen, they end up together forever at the end, so it's fine. you guys can make obnoxiously cute posts about what they would do in domestic situations if you want. so anyway, it's not just ogata who got my attention. but it is ogata who this post is about, so let's end this paragraph and leave room for more notes.

Noda-sensei will use any and every opportunity to show you the silhouette of a dick and balls swinging around during an action scene where people happen to be naked. However, he doesn't do that with Ogata. The reason is that he wants you to remember that Ogata is a serious bad guy character and doesn't want you laughing at his dick and balls. For the same reason, he also precludes Ogata from partaking in the horny otter sumo wrestling. In this essay, I will-- ok just kidding, they showed his dick and balls when he kicked koito in the face. and then they showed that exact panel again a few chapters later. with his dick and balls again.

i bet the hyaku in hyakunosuke is obviously referring to getting a 100% hit rate. (hyaku means 100, same kanji and everything. -nosuke is a common ending for a boy's name.) or to put it in sogeking terms, 100 shots, 100 hits, lu lu la la lu

it's interesting that out of the 4 people we see tsurumi gratuitously manipulate into loyalty, ogata is the only one where it doesn't stick very well. to be fair, tsurumi played his game with ogata a bit differently than with the others. he helped ogata kill his father and promised to help him rise through the ranks, but ogata didn't understand at first that tsurumi had an ulterior motive that would make hanazawa's death a win-win for him. it was usami who brought up mantetsu and made ogata understand he was being manipulated. but even knowing that, he thought tsurumi might uphold the other part of his end of the deal by helping ogata get into the army academy, so he was willing to play along. of course, tsurumi's time was split between everyone he was trying to manipulate (as well as pursuing his main goals), so everything couldn't happen at once. another problem was that each of them wanted to be daddy's only special little boy, and ogata was no exception, so he got impatient upon seeing him pay attention to the others and thought tsurumi wasn't working to help him fast enough. it was only when ogata decided that tsurumi wasn't holding up his end of the deal that he decided to betray him by working for central (in the hopes that central could uphold a similar deal instead). i think i'm getting that right. compared to what tsurumi did for tsukishima, he didn't do that much for ogata. but tsukishima was his masterpiece of manipulation-- look how much he got out of him. in the end, tsurumi wanted to cultivate soldiers who are dogs among sheep, but of course, ogata is a cat in that metaphor…

i didn't read the manga well enough the first time and was thinking that ogata's failure to advance in the ranks was because he just wasn't really good at anything but sniping, and sniping wasn't properly appreciated by the higher-ups. while those two things are basically true, i now understand that he couldn't get promoted because he didn't attend the necessary school and was ineligible for any promotion above his current rank, regardless of his skills. and that's why his roundabout desire to climb in the ranks was hinged on his going back to school, which he couldn't do without the help of either tsurumi or central. so complicated…

people ship ogata and sugimoto, and i'm really torn about that. they do look kinda good together, but first and foremost, sugimoto deserves better (and he deserves a character who doesn't die at the end). i also think that the dynamic between those two is not that fun or interesting-- yeah, they almost kill each other and then save each other, etc., and that's fun, but i mean all the other interactions. i think there's not that much potential between them. plus ogata shoots him in the head. maybe that part should have come first and foremost. he does shoot the man in the head. that being said, of course, there's not a lot of great options for sugimoto to begin with, so i understand when people want to put him with ogata-- they need someone for sugimoto to be horny with, and they need someone for ogata to be horny with. like, who else do we have for sugimoto? shiraishi? you could argue for it… tanigaki? but what he has with inkarmat is pretty good, and i hate to sully canon romances by shipping against them. kiroranke? dies. anyone in the army? they're living in different worlds at the end of the story… just not a lot of great options for sugimoto, who deserves the best. also, if ogata and sugimoto had anything between them, ogata's death would make sugimoto sad, and i wouldn't like that.

shiraishi/ogata might be funny though. i like that scene when shiraishi is like "boy am i hungry!" to the man with a gun who likes to hunt and ogata doesn't say anything or look at him. (other good options for shiraishi include kiroranke [who dies] and boutarou [who dies]. that's 3 for 3 dead. unfortunate.)

i saw some ogata fanart. some artists like to give him Sneaky Squints and Crafty Grin all the time. he is sneaky, and he has distinctive eyes, but i think canon makes it clear that Sneaky Squints and Crafty Grin is a very rare special occasion thing, and a huge majority of the time he only has Glassy Eyes and nothing at all going on with the mouth. and that is the righteous truth. in a manga, facial expressions are a very important part of characterization, especially for characters who are always around but not always involved, so i prefer fanart where people try to emulate (and exaggerate) the faces a character makes in canon instead of assigning their preferred faces to a given character. (an unrelated example of this assigning of preferences would be taking two complex characters and turning one into Stoic Seme and the other into Weepy Uke. it is shocking how thoroughly and audaciously people will squish characters into those two molds. what a waste of time.) i get that i'm probably in the top 1% of sticklerism when it comes to wanting characters to adhere strictly to canon in certain ways, but it's because i strongly feel that canon ogata who is making a neutral Ogata Face 95% of the time and a rare Other Face 5% of the time is true and beautiful. to sully that by tailoring his character to your preferences is your prerogative, but to hate that is also my prerogative. not that i would ever leave negative comments or anything along those lines, ever. because that's stupid and a waste of time. the most time i will waste in that way is the time it takes to write what i've been writing here.

ogata dakimakura is permitted but it has to be ogata laid up on a stretcher, wrapped up, splinted arm, with his face all puffy after getting dumped in the river by sugimoto. or it has to be ogata standing up wearing his uniform complete with little cape and his gun on his back and looking through his binoculars into the distance. or it has to be a watchtower spanning the length of the pillow and ogata is perched in it, looking through his binoculars into the distance.

i hate the relationship between ogata and usami. usami is the ultimate slimy little dog (derogatory). nasty little freak usami. ogata is wrong about almost everything, but he was right about usami being the cheapest piece on tsurumi's gameboard. nasty little wannabe sexual predator usami. that scene where ogata's like "i'm normal, right?" and usami is affirming all the things he's wrong about, it's like, the man is fucked up enough already! i can't believe i'm saying this, but you're a corrupting influence on him! i don't like how usami calls ogata "hyakunosuke" like they're friends… tsurumi calls him that because he's manipulating him and a cool dad calls his special little boy by his given name, but usami fucking hates him, and yet he calls him that anyway. something gross about it. usami's death was perfect. nasty little death. and i liked how ogata kept quiet due to bullet in mouth while usami was going on and on saying whatever he wanted while he beat the shit out of him, and then usami left after getting shot, and ogata felt compelled to say his one-liner to himself. fuckin nerd

i like the ogata who is seriously, seriously wondering if he's being haunted by his brother's ghost.

i think my one main beef with everyday heroes scans, who did an overall great job scanlating, is that they should have kept honorifics. keeping honorifics is a tough choice to make for a translator because it can be confusing for an english reader, especially when you come across one that's out of the standard few. but i was very surprised to find upon watching the anime that sugimoto calls asirpa "asirpa-san"; i had no way of knowing that in the manga! even though she's so much younger than him, even when their relationship becomes very close, even when yelling out her name in moments of desperation, he keeps the honorific. it might just be out of habit, but i think it indicates how much he respects her. it might be small, but something is lost by omitting the -san. honorifics and the ways people address each other are very important in japanese, and because this story takes place chiefly in japan, chiefly among japanese (and japanese-speaking) characters, i think keeping honorifics would have been perfectly appropriate in this circumstance. i also think it would have clarified some things for the readers rather than confusing them. (for contrast, it would make perfect sense to omit honorifics in a story that doesn't take place in japan but just happens to be written in japanese… though some meaning would still be lost.) (side note: EH scans does in fact keep some honorifics: the ainu word "nispa.") and sometimes, omitting the honorific in a context where it is important can make the translated wording MORE awkward. the example i'm thinking of is when ogata is recovering in the hospital and the scanlation shows him muttering, "yuusaku… sir…" now i'm 98% sure that ogata called yuusaku "yuusaku-dono," even though younger siblings typically get no honorifics, because yuusaku outranked him (and also maybe to show distance between them), and that's what he's muttering in that scene. i think it's less weird to call your younger half-sibling "-dono" in japanese than it would be to call your younger half-sibling "sir" in english. it's an in-between level of respect (and distance) that doesn't exist in english. so it became weirder in english, and leaving the honorific would have preserved that meaning. well, i do respect that EH scans made their decision about honorifics in the very beginning and then stuck with it to the very end. i guess it would have been worse if they selectively added in SOME honorifics when they thought it was important. but my opinion is that they should have made the decision to keep honorifics from the beginning.

in chapter 283, ogata falls asleep on the train and dreams of his mother singing a traditional song to him about how the way there is easy, but the way back is scary. i think the symbolism is clearly that it was easy for him to kill his mother and his brother, but it's not easy (or possible) to take it back. it's a one-way path that he chose. it's another subconscious manifestation of his feelings of guilt.

now here is something i've been puzzling over but which everyone but me has probably already made sense of. i think this is the only part of the manga that has stuck with me BECAUSE i am confused by it. chapter 199, page 6. kidnapped koito otonoshin, whose father just told him over the phone that he cannot be saved, is saying something heartbreaking in reply, and one of his captors is rubbing his back as if to comfort him. what else could that be but a comforting hand? am i mistaken? and it's got to be important because it takes up THREE panels! now, if you're like me and you've decided that tsukikoi is the OTP of golden kamuy, your first thought was to want tsukishima to be the one under the white hat, and ogata is the one watching disapprovingly because he's a jerk. but otonoshin smacks and bloodies the face of man in the white hat with the back of his head, and the wounds we later see (and basically everything else) make it clear that the white hat was ogata. (then of course they put those hats on russian-looking corpses that they obtained… somehow. kidnapped off the street?) (side note: when they take the white hat and mask off one of the corpses, otonoshin should have been suspicious right away, because that guy's nose wasn't bloodied or anything. but i'll let his lack of perception slide given the circumstances. unless he remembers it in a later chapter and i'm the one who forgot.) anyway, so it was clearly ogata who rubbed otonoshin's back, which seems really weird and out of character. i was thinking that it must have been that tsurumi gave them orders along the lines of not completely breaking the kid's will and making sure he isn't too physically or emotionally hurt (or else he and his father wouldn't be usable in the future). this would gel with the fact that tsurumi seems slightly surprised/perturbed when commander koito says he's going to tell otonoshin to die for his country (because of course that's not what tsurumi wants or had planned for). so maybe ogata interpreted those orders, thought otonoshin was giving up on life, and decided that he should make sure the kid's will wasn't completely broken by providing a little comfort. and then the glare from the black hat is tsukishima with a sentiment like, "you're giving the game away, you dumb piece of shit! captors wouldn't do that! ESPECIALLY IF THEY DON'T SPEAK JAPANESE!" but another possibility occurs to me. we heard from ogata when he was pointing his gun at huci that he doesn't want to just kill someone's grandma if he can help it. he's a cold-blooded killer when he thinks he has a reason, but maybe he does have the thinnest sentimental streak when it comes to people he does not perceive as a threat. so maybe that thin streak is showing here? kidnapping some weak kid might have been the dirtiest work tsurumi had ever put him up to at that point. (did he kill his father before or after this? but was that even dirty work to him, when he felt he had a good reason?) maybe he honestly felt emotionally reluctant to traumatize a defenseless 16-year-old like that, so he reached out to comfort him without thinking. i wonder what is the fandom consensus about that page, yet i feel reluctant to look it up… but whichever scenario it is, tsukishima's glare has to be him thinking, "man, you suck at dirty work." (and afterward, ogata glares at otonoshin because he's angry and humiliated that he underestimated how much of a threat a bound 16-year-old posed to him.)

EDIT: regarding the above paragraph, i think i've realized the correct interpretation. it's not that the situation of kidnapping a kid has activated ogata's thin sentimental streak. it's the specific circumstances of the lines that were just said: commander koito saying he could not save otonoshin, and otonoshin apologizing to his father and asking him to pretend he had never been born. that combination of circumstances was maybe the only thing that could flip ogata's empathy switch enough to make him reach out a comforting hand. he probably feels with great certainty that if he himself had ever been kidnapped and held for ransom, his own father would have told him to die for his country as well, and he might even have said a similar line in response. the pain otonoshin felt in that moment was so clear to ogata that he couldn't help but comfort him... it's a key emotional character development moment for ogata... with his face covered... but of course he misinterpreted otonoshin's resilience and that's how he got his nose bashed.

i cried a lot when i first read ogata's death chapter, and i cried a lot the second time too. i think noda-sensei might be a genius… one thing that didn't register on first reading was that ogata must have enjoyed the time he spent traveling with asirpa and the others in a way, even if he didn't exactly realize it. asirpa reminded him of yuusaku, not just in her innocence, but in the way she trusted him and ate with him and joked with him and treated him as if he were "normal" (when he believes he isn't normal). ogata was yearning for familial love his whole life; he just fixated on getting it only from his father, which wasn't going to happen, and ignored what he got from his mother and his brother. yuusaku was the only one who loved him, but he got some of that warm familial feeling from asirpa and the others as well, even though he usually acted cold. (i think he said "hinna" primarily to manipulate asirpa... but maybe after saying it, he felt happy.) and now, not only did he have to deal with his mistake of killing yuusaku, but here he was trying to kill asirpa too! not only that, but he was corrupting her into killing HIM, and he thought he wanted that, but he didn't! he couldn't even accept his old guilt, and now he was foolishly inflicting new guilt, as if by compulsion! it's so painful! as he breaks down, we see him realizing his mistake in real time, how his goal of proving his father worthless was itself worthless all along, how he didn't actually need to kill any of his family, how he was following the wrong path based on his delusions and misunderstandings his whole life, and it hurts him so much… and he tries to deny it, but he's having it explained to him by himself, and he can only trust himself… whenever he felt conflicted about anything, he would just find some way stamp out the opposing view and believe in himself, but now, both sides were him, so he couldn't do that, and as a result, he was defeated. the chapter was very emotionally powerful… he died a coward's death because, never having confronted his guilt before, he couldn't imagine being able to live with it… and vasily found his body by the railroad tracks and painted his fursona.

you could ship ogata with vasily but the fact remains that they spend vasily's entire span of appearance in the manga in a fight to the death and then one of them dies. also he shot vasily in the mouth. you can't shoot a mouth with your gun and then try to kiss it later. that's inappropriate

the last time ogata shoots sugimoto, he doesn't aim for the head. it's as though he learned his lesson. but it still didn't work, did it?

i saw the ogata nendoroid and took damage from it. hate it. i don't want any more chibis...

it seems that some things are changed in the volume releases of golden kamuy. i have only read the scanlated magazine releases. i wonder if i can be content to decide that this is the end of my ogata post when i don't know if any important ogata details were changed in the volumes. i would also like to read and compare the official translation. one thing i want to see in the volume releases is if noda-sensei ever goes back and adds teeth to the white voids of characters' mouths. it is incredibly clear to me that noda-sensei truly, viscerally hates drawing teeth. that's fair, but i do prefer even the vaguest semblance of teeth to a white void of a mouth. when he does draw teeth, they usually look perfectly passable. anyway, my next project will be deciding how to get my hands on the official translated volumes and then rereading again.

i think that might be all i have to say about ogata hyakunosuke right now.

[the-rest-is-silenc3]

I might have been the anon of the thing you were referring to? I sent the ask while I was triggered into dissociation because of syscourse and sent something stupid to a big syscourse blog, but I meant it more that people who aren't endogenic are about to participate in syscourse without their existence being questioned and have an advantage in that sense, not like societal privilege or anything like that.

Hi anon! im very sorry to hear that you were in a dissociative episode and a bad place when you sent that ask. To preface this, I hold no resentment or dislike toward you. I think you just had a little bit of a bad take. I have also said some stupid stuff in syscourse before, and in my opinion it's good for you to post a bad take and get your shit rocked every now and then. Also, you are completely anonymous now just as you were then. Don't worry about any repercussions or people thinking bad on you because literally nobody knows who you are. Now, onto the post. Here's what you said that alarmed me:

"Honestly I'd also say a lot of endogenic harassment might also boil down to a trauma response. Being constantly told you don't exist weighs heavily down on a person's psyche and it's reasonable to lash out. I feel like whenever I interact at the community I hit my limit so quickly. There's a bit of a level of privilege non-endogenic systems have because they aren't the ones who's literal personhood and existence aren't constantly being questioned. Syscourse is a demeaning, awful experience."

and don't get me wrong, I totally agree with almost everything you said here. It is demeaning to constantly be told your experiences aren't real, that you must be faking, or that you must have some secret trauma you just can't remember. However, I don't agree that non-endogenic systems are privileged over endogenic ones due to not being questioned as often.

First of all, I don't think non-endogenic systems are questioned less. CDD systems are questioned constantly in system spaces and in outside spaces for basically anything. Having too high an alter count. Having too low an alter count. Having fictives, being polyfragmented, etc. Of course, I do think that the questioning of endogenic existence is an especially severe and pervasive issue in system spaces, but I really don't think there is ANYBODY at all that is immune. Not traumagenic systems, not disordered systems, not CDD systems. And this isn't even mentioning the severe medical neglect and gaslighting many CDD systems face, where they DO get their personhood and existence denied.

Another thing is that syscourse really isn't everything. There is a disturbing trend of some endogenics saying that CDDs are privileged over them, and they do mean societally and medically. When you say CDD systems have a certain level of privilege over endogenic ones, I think it's easy to take that as the word "privileged" is usually used - social advantage. Even if it isn't what you meant, it did come across that way to me.

Another thing about your argument that I thought was interesting that I did not address in my original post was that you argued that it's reasonable for endogenic systems to lash out because we are constantly denied our existence. Which I also think is... not a good take. CDD systems are also denied their existence often, and they often blame and lash out at endogenic systems because of that. that definitely does not make it reasonable, so why would it be reasonable for endogenics to do it?

anyway rant over. I hope you have a good day, take care of yourself!

[kontextmaschine]

Tropes of Covid-worrier Twitter:

Shibboleths

"Covid is airborne!" - that the virus is spread through exhaled aerosols, not airborne moisture droplets or surface-tainting "fomites". A point they were genuinely more right on than authorities early on that still has some application – that only N95-type masks or respirators reliably stop transmission, not fabric or paper surgical masks. However, largely an ingroup signal at this point, they seem to believe that authorities not pointedly declaring it apropos of nothing causes or constitutes failure.

Corsi-Rosenthal Boxes: a DIY air filter made of box fans and furnace filters, because above. They love these things and are always frustrated that schools and public places won't welcome wild-eyed maniacs trying to set up their own homemade science fair projects everywhere.

CO2 testing: they carry around little CO2 monitors and are always tutting about how high the readings they get are, less in their own right than because it's a clear sign of a poorly ventilated space where exhalations are not being cleared. Once again, makes them look like maniacs.

"SARS-CoV-2": they kind of performatively always call Covid this, even using more characters of a tweet. I dunno if the intention was to differentiate the syndrome from the virus, or if putting it in the SARS lineage was supposed to draw on residual associations there, but by now it mostly seems like flaunting yourself as savvy.

Something there but iffy

That danger and damage increases with multiple infections. It is true that Danger(Case1 + Case2) > Danger(Case1), which means that Case2 (and subsequents) has some nonzero risk, but they often act like Danger(Case1) < Danger(Case2), which I don't see as well established at all.

Pretty convinced

The danger of Covid now lies largely not in the initial "acute" respiratory infection, but in the chance of later "long Covid" progression to other organ systems, that may render the sufferer vulnerable to later mortality. Damaged heart muscles lead to later heart attacks; blood vessels to strokes & aneurysm; immune systems to later infection (as seems to be making this winter an atrocious pediatric respiratory infection season, or made Jair Bolsonaro an infection piñata). I myself can attest to later blood pressure swings that cause fainting. That this explains much of the increase in "all-cause mortality" above and beyond that attributed to Covid itself since the beginning of the pandemic.

Not convinced

Immunity from prior infections or immunization does not durably reduce the severity of future ones. This is out of keeping with the experience of other coronaviruses already in regular human circulation and mutating into new variants, which after caught repeatedly throughout life become trivial. My own experience has my current infection (somewhere from my 4th to 6th, producing symptom "echoes" of the "long" portions of 1 and 2) as the worst since 2, but 2 was much less harsh than 1 and 3-current was nothing. I suspect this might be a stronger case against the background of a generally decreasing trend of severity. Also it might be the case that immunity wanes so subsequent cases are easier if they occur before it wears off (and leaves new immunity of its own), in which case attempts to stop any particular case with masking, isolation, or air treatment might make population-level health worse by lengthening average time between infections past acquired immunity duration.

"Schools should have been reworking their ventilation systems for anti-viral effect!" My father was the solicitor for our school district, in which capacity one of the things he worked with was contracting. At one point the district upgraded ventilation systems in maybe a third of their secondary schools at once. From scoping through passing a bond, soliciting and evaluating bids to work completion (when the construction market was slack enough for contractors to hire labor and buy materials cheap) was 8 years. In a small subset of schools, that already had ductwork at all, in a rich school district where the bond passed on the first try. To attempt this for every school building in the US – let alone other public places – would likely exceed the national HVAC construction capacity for decades. The only precedent I can think of, the drive to rework hospital ventilation systems against Legionnaires, affected far fewer buildings and institutions that were then fairly flush with income streams atop the healthcare economy, still required extensive federal subsidy, and was ongoing decades later.

[moss-sprouted]

i miss when a new popular site or trend wouldnt completely make a completely separate site change itself, especially for mobile users who cant use extensions to fix whatever the issue is

little changes here and there are fine, but youtube trying to be more like twitch or tiktok, and especially making it on mobile where searches are automatically filtered by shorts now and theyre constantly pushed on you is damaging because a lot of people try to avoid tiktok because it fucks with how our brains focus and it drowns out the content creators who dont and shouldnt Have to make shorts, and tumblr isnt immune to this either, even though is used to be to an extend

it's trying to be a clone of twitter, and twitch and tiktok all at once when a good majority of us came to tumblr originally because it Wasnt a clone, it was its own thing

you'd think the changes by elon musk on twitter would make other social media sites steer as far clear of replicating it or even other sites, but nothing can be its own thing anymore

its so incredibly frustrating because i enjoy some of the changes here on tumblr and wish they had existed 5, 10 years ago but i cant stand what theyve been doing now and how they wont even listen to the majority of their users about how we dont want these useless changes, i can stand them pushing the no ads thing on us because they want to make money and i get it, but the lives and the changing so many things rapidly and how the UI has functioned for years, how messages look, how you cant click on a reblog as easily now, everything is just inconvenient and unnecessary and i think a lot of people agree its completely unwanted

[arecipeforfeels]

Got high and decided I’m watching ca:tws so be ready for incoherence:

Marvel movies used to MEAN SOMETHING

They did however always live in the pocket of the military

I don’t care I would eat this movie if I could

They were so insane for it and they had to do civil war as the worlds worst no homo ever

HE DOESNT HAVE ANYONE AROUND THAT SHARES HIS EXPERIENCE COS HES LOST IN TIME

THE WHOLE MOVIE IS HIM BEING UNSUCCESSFULLY SET UP ON DATES

I hate everything

I also am not immune to an action sequence and some fun music….

Also it is very impressive how violent they can make these movies and completely get away with it if there’s no blood splatter

Bad guys r French, more at 10

I took a kickboxing class in like 2013 bc I thought black widow was hot and wanted to also be hot

(Sidenote, I also played basketball for five years bc of high school musical. I have never had an original thought in my life)

FIGHT SCENE NUMBER TWOOOOO

This is an iconic one cos it’s the one where he puts his shield on his back to fight for Even Footing (and also ON VA VOIR U WILL ALWAYS B FAMOUS)

people went so bonkers for that

Tag urself Im the giant harddrive

Okay goofiest admission ever: in this movie there’s a bunch of time spent in this one big building that’s supposedly located in dc. But it’s got this big giant atrium with a huge high steel and glass ceiling, and at some point during this movie someone hits it or crashes through it or shoots it. And every time I hear the words “glass ceiling” I think of this fuckin movie

CHEKHOVS ELEVATOR

“Wow yayyyyyyy war machiiiiiiime!! For sEcUriTy”

US Army wet dream while still trying to keep Cap there as a voice of reason

It’s a fascinating dichotomy

Air and spase! Museum (great night at the museum 3 reference)

Also I cannot believe he goes to his own fuckin exhibit

...actually upon reflection I too would go to my own exhibit

The endgame revisionism of him going back in time is soooooo stupid she does not exist to me

It’s such character assassination of everyone involved

(I don’t care, I say caringly, as I care deeply)

I also had (had??) a massive crush on Hailey atwell

Robert Redford is here

Weird joke about Algerians and the French

THERE IS AN ACTUAL COMPELLING CONVERSATION ABOUT PTSD

This movie is also a Chevy ad

Also I remember seeing the big SUVs in this movie and being like “damn those are tanks” they are also nothing compared to what’s out there now

This movie also feels so much more grounded in actual life

Like we talk abt all the CGI coming in later movies, this one feels gritty in comparison, on simply a mechanical level

Speed tour of dc

We have reached the civilian casualty stage of the movie

I can’t imagine how much money Samuel L Jackson has made off these movies

THE CAR FLIP SHOT W BUCKY IIIIIIIIII (editors note: this is where the coherence begins to go downhill. You can sense the trend)

god this movie

THE SHIELD CATCH IM EATING MY SHOES

Elevator scene lets fuckin goooooooooo

Let’s GOOOOOOOO

the tension build is so good

Everyone say thank u Steve rogers for breaking the glass ceiling

This movie is also an apple ad…2014

GUY WHO FULLY HITS ON STEVE AT THE APPLE STORE

Look the fuckin Natasha Steve bromance in this is lovely

Buddy comedy

I will say this was such a moment for the MCU, the hydra reveal

Esp cos like agents of shield was in its heyday etc etc

2014 sure was a time

This man [Toby Jones] has been so comically typecast forever

OPERATION PAPERCLIP CASUAL NAMEDROP

god

This is so fascinating to me Bc it’s like “Here is how we revisionize the United States’ history of interfering in coups etc etc it was bad guys in the government doing it etc etc”

“What we need to to is get back to the good government”

Sam Wilson the man that you are

Bucky shows up at any time in this fucking movie and I start barking

I am also always thinking of the “we shot him in ze legs” vine

This is my Roman Empire

“I knew him” oooouuuuugggHHHH

RIP Stan Lee

Bucky yeets a guy into a jet engine and by god does he look good doing it

This stupid movie (editors’s note: caught in a miasma of 2014)

[jcmarchi]

Annie Liau: Infinite caring for the MIT community

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/annie-liau-infinite-caring-for-the-mit-community/

Annie Liau: Infinite caring for the MIT community

Growing up in Thailand, Annie Srethabhakti Liau could not have imagined spending the bulk of her career working at the storied Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Now, as she heads into retirement, she and those around her are reflecting on her journey to Cambridge, Massachusetts, and on four decades as an integral member of the MIT community.

One of the longest-serving physicians at MIT Health, Liau is an obstetrician and gynecologist who managed the delivery of some 1,500 babies and oversaw an estimated 100,000 visits with patients during her tenure at the Institute. For her extraordinary work ethic and unsurpassed care for patients and colleagues alike, Liau has become a beloved figure at both MIT and at the affiliated hospitals she’s worked at for the past 39 years.

From Bangkok to Cambridge

Liau was born in Bangkok to Chinese parents, the eldest of six children. Her father was a physician who traveled the world for his training and practice, so Liau was exposed early on to the idea of caring for others as a vocation. Her parents strongly valued education for all their children and made that a priority, starting with young Annie. In school, her teachers encouraged her inclinations toward math and science, and her stellar grades earned her a place at Mahidol University, where she decided to follow in her father’s footsteps and pursue a career in medicine.

In the 1970s, when her mother opted to move the family to the U.S. to be closer to relatives already here, Liau, then a young adult, followed suit. She initially stayed in Thailand to complete her medical training at Mahidol, but after passing a number of exams, Liau began her career in New England, at medical centers in Waltham and Brighton, Massachusetts, and Danbury, Connecticut. By this time, she had decided to specialize in obstetrics and gynecology. “I feel that it’s a miracle to be part of the beginning” of life, she says. “Continuing the journey with the patient to all the stages in life, it seemed to be very fulfilling.”

Before long, she saw a position listed in the New England Journal of Medicine for a full-time physician at what was then MIT Medical — now MIT Health. It was the mid 1980s, and MIT Health had recently moved into its current location in Building E23 from its previous headquarters in Building 11. Liau was excited about the opportunity to serve a changing Institute population — one in which women were an increasing percentage of the student and faculty bodies.

“I just love the feeling of caring and healing,” Liau says. “I always felt from the beginning that MIT Medical is MIT Health: It always embraces the wellness, immunizations, community support. It wasn’t just taking care of the sick. … We need to take care of the MIT population so that they are well and they can focus on their work, so they can actually achieve their goals.”

Infinite care

From the start, Liau’s services were in high demand. An MIT Tech Talk article from the early 1990s described a period in which “the queue to see her was extremely long.” At the time, MIT Health doctors oversaw the births of some 200 babies per year — a number that Liau says has since dropped by about two-thirds, largely mirroring a national trend in birth rate.

During her time at MIT, Liau held appointments at several Boston-area hospitals, where she helped Institute affiliates give birth at all hours of the day and night. In addition, she served as a part-time instructor with Harvard Medical School (HMS). She was also a preceptor for gynecology residents at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and for medical students from HMS, the Harvard-MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology, and Boston University. And she has served on numerous committees and professional societies, including as the past president of the Obstetrical Society of Boston.

Back on campus, Liau not only supported those expanding their families but also any community members in need of basic gynecological care.

“With our recent rebrand to MIT Health, we’ve been talking about ‘Infinite Caring’ as the underpinning of how we care for the people of MIT. To me, Dr. Liau is the epitome of Infinite Caring — and has been for 39 years,” says Cecilia Stuopis, MIT’s chief health officer and a fellow obstetrician/gynecologist. “She has cared for generations of women at MIT by being curious about their lives, their well-being, and their overall state of health. She is always learning and always teaching her patients and colleagues about what she has learned. Most importantly, she does all of these things with incomparable levels of kindness; kindness defines Dr. Liau in all aspects — professionally and personally.”

“Dr. Liau has been the foundation of our department,” says Chana Wasserman, chief of obstetrics and gynecology at MIT Health who has worked with Liau for over 26 years. “She is very personable and truly interested in people’s wellness. She always wants to learn from everyone and everything. She reads and retains everything she hears or learns. When professors, graduate students, or postdocs request her help with their research studies, she goes above and beyond to really try to help them. She has tremendous empathy for patients and colleagues alike.”

At a recent farewell event during which Liau had a chance to say goodbye to longtime patients, one attendee noted that while it’s unusual to look forward to gynecological appointments, she found that to be the case every time she went to see Liau.

“With Annie, it seems the construct of time is nonexistent and all that matters is that patient and their well-being,” says Nicole Napier, population health manager at MIT Health who worked closely with Liau for 18 years in her former role as the OB/GYN nurse practice manager. “She understands the true ‘health’ of a person is shaped by their personal relationships, diet, sleep, overall outlook on life, and many other factors. Her goal is to assess and advise on as many of these factors as possible to make you the best human being you can be. … Her ability to care knows no limits.”

Part of the family

In recognition of her remarkable service, Liau has over the years earned four MIT Health awards, including two Infinite Mile Awards, for clinical excellence and for lifetime contribution; the Commitment to Care Team Award; and the Patient Choice Award. She also regularly earned MIT Health’s highest Press Ganey scores, which measure patient satisfaction.

Colleagues and patients have expressed myriad ways in which Liau will be missed — from sharing findings from seminars she’d attend to constantly serving as a valued partner in health as well as a cherished friend.

Several colleagues mentioned Liau’s gifts of fruit — oranges and persimmons, especially — that would frequently appear on their desks. “I had always thought that Dr. Liau only gave me fruit since she knew I would never bring lunch to work,” says Wasserman. “At her retirement party at Mount Auburn [Hospital], though, one of the speakers asked the audience to raise their hand if they had ever received a piece of fruit from Dr. Liau. Almost the entire crowd raised their hands! This is just a small way that she made sure not only that I had something to eat, but that everyone she knew was kept healthy and well.”

“Every day she walks into the building, whether she’s scheduled to work or not, she cares about her patients and colleagues,” adds Eleashea Passley, a patient service representative at MIT Health who worked with Liau for 19 years. Liau was, according to Passley, “a social butterfly” who, in addition to fruit offerings, often delighted her team with lunch orders of comfort food to help keep spirits high.

In retirement, Liau is looking forward to quality time with family. She plans to help care for her mother, who is now 90 and looking to move back to Massachusetts following four years on the West Coast. She also aims to visit with her siblings, nieces, nephews, and their children around the country. And she hopes to get a bit more sleep and exercise, and to attend more lectures, services, and other events.

“I will miss the connection between me and my patients, and also the staff at MIT and at the hospital. I have been at MIT more than half of my life, so it’s really special. I feel like I grew up here,” says Liau. “I feel very moved and very thankful for the love and appreciation from my patients, and I’m grateful for their trust and for the support throughout the years. I feel like they’re part of my family. … I just help to navigate the care, like someone in the family, but I’m really grateful and thankful that they looked out for me, too.”

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