#so much good shit in this ep

[frau-kali]

John Silver in Every Episode (2x07)

[criston-cole]

You told me it was our duty to hold the realm united against a common foe. By naming me heir, you divided the realm.

[dizzybizz]

cute date idea: feel a bit homesick while watching aurora borealis for a bit before absolutely destroying yourselves on black sand

[luck-of-the-drawings]

so REVENGE, HUH? or justice, if that makes you feel better. it tastes the same when cooked just right. 'I REALLY WANTED A BROTHER.' such a shame to burn a bridge you so desperately wanted to keep, especially when it wasnt even you who started the fire. especially when you hope that not a single fragment of that bridge ever washes ashore.[MAY IT ROT FAR FROM MY SIGHTS] an unfortunate loss! atleast he has his friends.

[chosetoseethebestinyou]

*RTD writing a grand finale where old companions come back and he teases a David Tennant regeneration but then he just splits in half and one of him gets to live his well deserved happily ever after*

[ruporas]

soft (and some bittersweet)

[poisonedfate]

bbc merlin - 04x05 His Father's Son

top 10 breakups of all time

[simptasia]

LOST: Season One

[markantonys]

reddit:

literally every other WOT viewer in the world:

[columboscreens]

[darth-does-stuff]

ok wait why is this recent ep actually fucking terrifying i did not expect it to be this scary

[frau-kali]

[bacchuschucklefuck]

the nsbu table is five DM pets and rekha shankar

[dizzybizz]

sleepy gill and gill with the bubbled evil cat

[luck-of-the-drawings]

ANCIENT wip that i finally got around to splashin color onto. NO idea where this colorin style came from n it WONT happen again!! anyway i LOOOVE the general dynamic between arthur n emizel. both are so cool and so awesome and yet SO silly...

[crimeronan]

there are literally incalculable meta posts i could make about the silt verses (it’s one of those stories where i have thoughts about Every Damn Line) but tonight i’m thinking about how..... DELICIOUSLY it sets up and then subverts your worldbuilding expectations.

if you haven’t listened yet. consider this mini essay my pitch. (or rather one of many pitches.)

because you start with this narrative episode about two members of an outlawed religion seeking other members of their faith, and they’re both compelling and sympathetic and layered narrators, but also. one is describing a childhood built on drowning and torturing people to death and the other is delighted by sacrificial corpses and horrific apparitions of eldritch nonsense and you’re like, “okay, yeah, this is a horror podcast. i can pretty damn well see why your religion is outlawed jesus FUCK you guys how is there THIS MUCH MURDER involved in your religious rites-”

and one of the narrators tells you that society is hypocritical because the legal religions Also cause harm. and if you’re anything like me, you go okay, girl, whatever you need to tell yourself to justify your current crusade. your god is a special kind of fucked up but it’s all good

then of course there are hints of social worldbuilding that challenge this assumption, but it’s not until paige’s introduction ep that you’re smacked Full In The Face with like. All Of It. 

because paige is a law-abiding citizen high up on the corporate food chain, and she works a mundane job at a branding company. 

and the company’s margins are bad. 

and the company’s industry is shrinking. 

and the company needs to cut costs and reinvigorate its own brand. 

and of course this is a difficult time for everyone but flexibility is necessary to stay competitive in a cutthroat world.

and now the company is torturing its low-performing employees to death in front of everyone as a corporate ritual. viscerally described. 

and paige, who JUST watched her closest work friend die in the most horrific way imaginable, is playing her part as someone high up on the corporate food chain.

she is being upbeat and being cheerful and encouraging her surviving coworkers to “look lively” and pretending that nothing happened. 

and not a single person protests. and no one shrieks in horror and everyone shifts back into their worksona and the day passes without any particular note because this is a social norm and layoff-sacrifices are too commonplace to report and it is legal and it is accepted and it is a good way to boost the flagging numbers for the giant capitalist machine.

and you have this realization that. 

this Really Is how the world is. 

there really ISN’T anything separating the outlaw narrators’ rituals from those of the corporate and city-based gods.

and then the follow-up question becomes, “wait, then why is THEIR god banned?? if it’s not the murder and the horror then why is their god banned???? what’s the fucking difference????”

and the answer is that their outlawed god draws people away from the cities and the factories and the oil rigs and the pollution and the mineshafts. and their outlawed god does not contribute anything to the state. 

and it’s not about what people worship or what the gods want or what the rituals require or what the hallowed bodies look like.

it’s just about how The State (TM) and Capitalism (TM) are both systems that have weaponized the law to kill every god that doesn’t contribute to their money and power and exploitation and culture and control.

and then it’s.... it’s not about the horror anymore.

it’s not a story of two deeply flawed protagonists from a sick and twisted cult who are reasonably forced into the shadows of a largely normal world because They Are In A Horror Story, And Are Doing What Horror Protagonists Do (Being Fucking Crazy).

it’s a story about our world. the one we live in. we the listener. here in our modern-ass non-supernatural late-stage-capitalism world. it’s about all the structures we’ve built and burned and all the destruction at the center of that goddamn world.

the eldritch gods and terrors are just set dressing.