#talking about any news related to fantasy or sci fi media

[walkingnightmare]

on a serious note, the one major grievance i actually have with the episode is the random weird “blood family is more important” undertones sprinkled in

(psa i have no problem with ruby wanting to find her birth mom. that is normal and not what im talking about. also this can just be me reading into stuff but i did catch it on my first watch which is why im talking about it)

what i am talking about is the magical properties and language used around louise’s importance in regards to ruby.

louise is SO IMPORTANT that she (a human) gives ruby (also a human) the ability to do inhuman things despite never knowing her.

now the “power of family” is nothing new in fiction. It’s used in a lot of media, especially sci fi and fantasy. But the thing is there is no basis for this power. there are no established rules that say this is something that can happen. ruby didn’t inherit these powers as her mom doesn’t have them (to our knowledge) and ruby doesn’t have any “biological powers” (like superpowers). so, why does she have them in the first place? and if its because she loves her family so much it manifested, why doesn’t she already have this power since she loves carla so much?

(im aware this is used to find her bio mom, but you HAVE to have an in-universe explanation for it other than “i want to find my bio mom.” there are PLENTY of ways you can do that without giving ruby unnecessary and illogical powers. this also gives her a BUNCH of plot armor but thats another conversation for another post)

but the line- yes line!- that pissed me off the most was when ruby says she wants to find her “real mom.” now this could have just been a slip in the writers room to mean bio. but in what way is louise ruby’s “real mom?”

this term has been used for a loooooong time to make adopted kids feel unwanted and separate because they’re not blood related and it makes me mad seeing it in the “outcast and proud” tv show.

like carla has raised ruby since she was practically born. carla is in every right her mother. she loves her, raised her, supports her endeavors and wants her to be safe. carla is her mom. and she may not be the person who birthed her but she is the one who took care of her when no-one else would.

im tired of seeing blood family be more important than the people you choose.

[clairedaring]

Nonkul and Bright's experience in queer media prior to I Feel You Linger In The Air

So... I've fallen down the huge rabbit hole that is I Feel You Linger In The Air (even though I was already down bad earlier this year when I finished the novels) since the airing of the series. I've tried my best to consume everything translated IFYLITA-related content and now I'm here to summarize a few points I love about the (immaculate) casting of Nonkul and Bright.

For Nonkul

Prior to IFYLITA, Nonkul has had a few BL-adjacent projects:

2014 indie gay film "Love's Coming", where he plays a friend of the gay protagonist.

2016 sitcom series "Bang Rak Soi 9/1", where he plays a student with a crush on his straight best friend (main character played by Tongtong, who you may have known from To Sir With Love or Khun Chai)

2019 chinese bromance "Dive", where he plays the 2nd main lead who develops "strong friendship" with the protagonist as swimming teammates

But IFYLITA marks Nonkul's first time playing in a BL series where he is the protagonist.

Back in 2021, Nonkul posted this Q&A video on Facebook, where he answered the question "If you have a chance, would you consider playing in a BL series? If accepted, who do you to co-act with?". To which Nonkul went on a full long discussion on how he doesn't view BL as a genre and talks about what kind of role he would want to play (full clip below).

Transcript:

If that series is an interesting storyline for me, I am always open to any kind of genre. I never categorized BL series as an BL series, I just think of it as a series with another plot as part of my work. It is a normal series that can have any of the plots which I will categorize as Romantic Comedy, Drama or whatever. Thus, when I choose the BL series I want to work with, the love preference of the character does not affect my decision. If the plot of the series is interesting, of course I'm gonna do it for sure. Every work that I chose, I personally think it at least enjoyable for me. Of course, if in the future, there are BL series with plots that I find interesting, that I enjoyed the script. "Like, wow, that's my type!", I will definitely selected it to be my future project. A good written series is a good series. This is what I believe as an actor. - Nonkul

For BL Series, I think I can work with everyone. I don't think I have anyone in particular. One thing! I desire the character of that person/actor? to be close to the character in the series. At that point I will be satisfied. Sometimes, I as an actor have a chance to work with people who didn't have a lot of acting experience. I will still discover something new from him as well. And there is a BL novel which I really like! [Nonkul explains the plot of his favorite BL Novel 'Peremo'] I would prefer to choose the "heroine" role because it will be a new experience for me as an actor because it will be a new experience for me as an actor. Because basically I only play as a hero role for the main character or support character in my work, but a "heroine" role in a BL series is the only chance for me to play a character more feminine. So it is a new experience for me. [Nonkul continues raving about 'Peremo']. But if you think that you can make [an adaptation of Peremo], please do not forget me, Nonkul! Pleaseeeeeeee, I will do my best, I promise!!! However, I'm not only fixated on this novel. I'm also open for many more BL series if there is an interesting plot. - Nonkul

Interestingly the 3 checklists Nonkul mentioned his dream BL novel/character 'Peremo' had was 1. playing the 'heroine' role; 2. it has a LOT of action; 3. it is also sci-fi fantasy genre. And then in 2022, Nonkul booked 2 action dramas and IFYLITA which checked off criteria 1 and 3 of his wishlist (he mentioned it in this interview).

In 2022, at the beginning of IFYLITA announcement event, Nonkul mentioned that one of reasons that he accepted to play Jom in IFYLITA is that the story didn’t just put love scenes in just for fan services. Previously he had rejected some series because of that.

Nonkul read the novel prior to the acceptance of the role and you can tell he put a lot of care into bringing Jom to life (Nonkul immediately tweeting his apology after the pilot trailer is out about him accidentally using right hand to sketch (because Jom is left-handed), discussing various novel details with fans of the book at event, discussing how to punch Ohm like Jom would instead of punching him regularly as he would in other series, even giving book-film comparison commentaries in the BTS of the episodes)

Nonkul's physical and facial features are also so similar to Jom in the novel, especially his Chinese heritage is taken into account by the casting directors (Jom is also Thai of Chinese heritage iirc). Honestly kudos to P'Tee and co for snatching Nonkul.

For Bright

Prior to IFYLITA, Bright has played a supporting male gay character in the CH3 Lakorn 'Rivalry' and starred in PP Krit's MV 'It's Okay Not To Be Alright'.

But IFYLITA still marks Bright's first ever male lead role (ngl I was quite shocked when I found out about this because like the man is SIGNED to CH3, what are they doing?) AND his first official "BL" series.

Bright also accept the role of Khun Yai after he went to buy the novel and read them.

Before filming, Bright practiced a lot to portrayed Khun Yai as close to the novel as possible (the way Khun Yai walks with hands behind his back, his posture, him speaking in the different local dialect...)

Here are some translated interview questions Nonkul and Bright did before filming IFYLITA for bangkokbiznews that I found really interesting and want to share (original Thai article) (translated by twitter user lingerair/eugust)

Question: How is your individual characters? How are they similar or different from you? (1)

Nonkul: Jom and I are very different. Jom has soft and sensitive part. He cried so many times, and often gets upset with things that if it's me, I wouldn't be upset like him but his tears is already flowing. Bright: Khun Yai is quite similar with me. He's calm and wise. It's easy to be Khun Yai when I read the script. I try to put myself as Khun Yai. I'm Khun Yai and Khun Yai is me. I always think like this to be able to moderately act as Khun Yai.

Question: BL series has become a powerful "soft power". What do you about this? (2)

Nonkul: To be honest, whatever entertainment media it is, I view all of them as soft power but can't deny that during this period foreigners are especially interested in Thai Y series. I think it's a good thing. In the end, no matter what kind of content they are interested, it's a pleasant thing. Bright: Bright agrees (to that) very much. There are so many BL series with many fans both in and outside of the country, thus I think that it's good quality soft power in presenting a lot of things. Such as "I Feel You Linger In The Air" has a lot of Thai culture incorporated it in. Nonkul: Since it's period (series), it won't look like we're forcing Thai culture into (the series). We want foreigners to learn about how was it during the era and how it affects the present.

Question: This novel has a lot of fans waiting, do you feel pressured in taking a role in this? (3)

Nonkul: There's a little bit of pressure but personally, when I've worked till this point, I'm kinda used to this. I can say that I already have some expectations (for myself) and receive some pressures as a motivation in working but I'm not that stressed by it. Bright: Similar to Non, I'm a little bit pressured but we will both do our best, everyone will do their best. Fans has expectations because they want to watch the adaptation. We'll do it in our way and we hope everyone'll likes it.

As a huge fan of the novel, I just love how much love Nonkul and Bright have for the original novel and the amount "homework", care and dedication they have to crafting their characters to be as close as possible. I really hope everyone who have reservation or hesitance watching I Feel You Linger In The Air because you didn't vibe with previous Dee Hup House’s productions, should still give IFYLITA a chance (or at least try watching Episode 6 & 7) because it is seriously unlike any previous DHH’s productions (in all aspects: plot, direction, pacing, cinematography, music, lighting, color-grading, overall production…)

For my post on Bright and Nonkul's preparation for IFYLITA

[king0fcrows]

If you're looking for Dreamwidth communities that cater to horror, sci-fi, fantasy-- I just found the following:

This comm is a dedicated space to talk about all things that relate to speculative fiction (horror, sci-fi, fantasy, mythology, ect.) of ANY medium.

It looks like on Sundays they always upload a post specifically created to give everyone a space to "squee"/excitedly talk about their favorite "thing" (literally any sci-fi, horror, fantasy media) they've been obsessing over in the comment section.

I'm keeping an eye out and will likely comment when they post today's weekly post.

Maybe go show them some love and try to meet some new people?

[squeemcsquee]

Otakon 2023: Day 0 (Thurs) and Day 1 (Fri)

Time to get off my butt and actually write this up. I am combining Day 0 and Day 1 into the same post, because I don't really have a lot to say about Thursday itself.

Also: I have only been to Otakon in-person once before. You won't find a write-up on that one, as it was 2012, in Baltimore, and that's well before I started doing write-ups to help myself remember the con. I did do Otakon online during the COVID shutdown but I also didn't really do write-ups of my online con experiences.

We drove out to DC from IL, and overall, it went okay. The worst part was honestly getting into DC itself and into the con hotel, just due to traffic congestion and constant rerouting from Google Map to try to get us there faster. But we arrived with plenty of time to still locate the con center and get our 18+ wristbands (our badges came in the mail, so we had those).

Day Zero: Thursday

The walk to the con center from our con-affiliated hotel was fine (5 minutes, tops). Getting into the con center...eh. Otakon did make posts about where to go on Thursday.

Should be easy, right? Except that are multiple doors along L street and the map doesn't really indicate which one was the proper one. And there was only one lone staffer to direct people away from the wrong entries. Several people got snapped at by con center security for accidentally going to the wrong doors first. Including myself and @lechevaliermalfet

Once inside in the right area, con center security brusquely sent us through and into the line to direct us to the registration, wristband pickup, and info areas. Lines and crowding weren't too bad and any issues were more because of brusque & confusing direction from con center security, not Otakon staff.

Still, we got through fairly quickly. And that was all we had for Thursday that was con-related.

So, on to Friday!

Day One: Friday

Friday started off with our arrival at the con center and the realization that @lechevaliermalfet would get to go to the "fast line" for entry, as he didn't have a bag at all. I, however, had a backpack with a reusable water bottle, my wallet, etc. So I got to go through bag check. Thankfully, it went rather quickly.

The rules were technically "No outside food or drink" but from everything I've read through social media, people found this enforced differently all weekend. I was in line talking with an attendee who had jerky and other small snacks in her bag. Both of us were waved through, no problem, and weren't pulled aside for a closer bag check after we passed the metal detector.

Right away, @lechevaliermalfet and I met back up inside the con center to check-in on our plans for the day. @lechevaliermalfet was off to a screening room to watch Galaxy Express 999: The Movie as a relaxing start to his con. But I wanted to do panels, so off I went.

The first panel I attended was on Anime Adaptations of Western Sci-Fi/Fantasy Literature, right at 0900. This was an entertaining panel and I learned about some adaptations I hadn't known existed before. It was also decently attended for being right at the start of the con on a Friday morning.

During most of the panel, I kept thinking that the panelist sounded super familiar, but I couldn't figure out why. Turns out that I had watched another of his panels during COVID shutdown. One that I was looking forward to seeing in-person later on Friday.

After that panel, I went to History and Influence of Shoujo Manga. I am pretty sure I've attended similar panels in the past, either virtually or in-person, but I find that I usually still pick up new bits of information, since different panelists will highlight different aspects of history. This time, I learned about a manga magazine that I had never heard of before.

After the panel ended, I rejoined @lechevaliermalfet. Our friends O. and R. were also there - it was our first time seeing either in-person in years. We set out to obtain lunch while just catching up. Well, the guys caught up - I was busy griping about the Guidebook.

See, I've been rather spoiled by the ACen version of Guidebook every year - the notes features, the chance to rate panels, the way you can choose a specific schedule track to look at, the information in the dining guide, etc. What I noticed about Otakon's Guidebook is that there was a lot less to it overall. Sure, all of the important details were there - maps, panel info, schedule, guest info. But it just felt lacking after years of using the app for ACen.

That was a continued gripe for me all weekend. Just to note.

We had lunch at Capitol Burger, which was fantastic. It's only a few blocks from the con center. Prices are a little on the pricier side (think about $15-25 for a burger, depending on your toppings, etc) but the service was fast and excellent, as was the food.

After lunch, we went back to the con to do a basic walk through the Dealers Room, just to get a feel for what was on-hand. I was surprised at the lack of industry presence. I know that Discotek Media was on-site. But I didn't see VIZ, RightStuf, Crunchyroll, Sekai Project, or any of the others I've grown accustomed to seeing at ACen. Different audiences attract different industry partners, and I get that. It just surprised me.

There was a section dedicated to Macross, due to the anniversary. We stopped to take a look.

We also found one wrapped car on display, from Initial D.

The guys made some purchases at booth selling soundtracks - booths like these don't appear as often at cons as they used to, as O. pointed out.

R. and I stood in line at the Otakon booth to get some official merchandise. It moved at a good pace, but it still took us roughly 30-ish minutes to get through and make our purchases. They split the line so that there was space for cross-traffic to walk behind the booth, so you had to line up along one wall, then wait to be waved over to the next part of the line when you were close to the booth. It wasn't a bad idea, really, in terms of traffic flow. But it felt a bit unnecessary for how empty the room still was in the early afternoon.

Otakon was offering a pin trading program in the dealer's room, but I honestly just bought the con ones to keep for myself, not to trade. And a hat, since the sun was harsh outside and weather was also predicted for the weekend and I didn't have a jacket. The hat was slightly too big when I finally tried it on, lol.

As big as the dealer's hall was - and it was big - it felt very empty. The aisles were incredibly wide, which did allow for great traffic flow, but it still felt as though there was a lot of underutilized space. I took some photos for a bird's eye view of the area when we left. Con center security was making absolutely certain that no one stayed longer than 5 minutes taking in the view from above. And if you weren't taking a photo, they were even more eager to hustle you away.

From the Dealers Room, we said goodbye to R., who had to leave for the day. O., @lechevaliermalfet, and I headed to the panel I'd been looking forward to attending in-person ever since I'd heard it would be at Otakon: Awesomely Bad Japanese Music Videos.

I knew about this panel from following the @conventionalwisdomcomic for years and had caught it streaming during COVID shutdown. I enjoyed it then, but I thought that the vibe was likely to be even better in-person.

It was being shown in the AMV theater, and the staffer let us know they wouldn't be doing a room clear, so we were welcome to go in and find seats while the previous panel was wrapping up. So we caught the last 10-15 minutes of the Let's Make an Anime Opening! improv panel. It was...not great. Maybe if we'd been there from the get-go, it would've been better. It was run by the Chaos at the Coffee Shop podcast team and I think they're going to be releasing the song on social media at some point.

But they weren't who I was there for. And I was glad to learn, even before @awesomelybadjmusicvideos got started, that the vibe for being there in-person was much better than viewing it online. Just hearing people reacting to the facts and entertainment slides being shown while the main event got set up was enough to convince me of that.

Obviously, I didn't record during the panel itself. But it really is worth attending. I laughed so hard at some of the videos and some of the antics of the panelists. I also knew full-well that I would be exposed to the Tarako song, and I think @lechevaliermalfet sort of knew, but O. was entirely unprepared for it. Watching his reaction was a treat.

The team do put up their playlist online, so I'll tag their tumblr again: @awesomelybadjmusicvideos

After the panel, we said goodbye to O. for the day. We decided to explore the con a little bit, just to get more familiar with the center layout. Crowds were definitely starting to increase now that we were entering the late afternoon.

We found the video gaming and photoshoot hall. And we got to enjoy a game similar to Magical Drop

@lechevaliermalfet kicked my butt in this game.

We also got dinner from a pizza spot in the con center during this time. They only offered personal-pan cheese or pepperoni, and they were out of pepperoni. My poor pizza got a little messed up.

Still, it was good pizza and it worked well for a reasonably quick dinner. And we were able to just people watch and enjoy the Otakon vibes.

After dinner was Artist Alley. Again, widely spaced and therefore oddly empty feeling at times. We saw where the art auction was, but never got around to checking it out.

As we bought art, I was storing smaller items in my bag. Then I felt that it was damp. Since my water bottle wasn't leaking, we found an empty spot and I began to dump out the bag. Turns out I'd had a small, hotel-size bottle of lotion in my bag and it had exploded all over everything. Thankfully, the purchases it got on were wrapped in shrinkwrap, so the actual products themselves weren't damaged. But it meant that we decided to return to the hotel so I could try to clean up the bag and so we could drop off our purchases. (Spoiler: the bag wouldn't clean out properly, so I ditched it for the rest of the weekend.)

When we returned to the con, I checked out the line situation for a workshop I'd wanted to attend. Even though the workshop wasn't for another hour, the line had already reached its capping point. So, that meant it was time for The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly: A History of Space Westerns in Anime. I always try to have backup plans in case I can't get into panels I want to attend (or the lines for them, lol). Once again, I enjoyed myself during the panel and learned some new information.

After that, it was time for the only 18+ panel I attended all weekend: You Can't Do That on Japanese TV: Anime Censorship in Japan. This wasn't just about glowing beams of light to hide genitals, even though the panel was 18+. There was also discussion on pulling or delaying episode airings due to current events, or why there may be editing changes even from channel to channel if a show switches stations.

The room was packed, by the way. @lechevaliermalfet were like numbers 90 and 91 in line to attend it, and there were plenty of people behind us. I don't know if the room filled to capacity, but I'm sure it was over halfway there by the time it started.

And then, the last panel of the night: Into Another World: A History of Isekai. It was fine. It was the first panel I'd been to for Otakon where I found my attention drifting. And I didn't really learn anything new from it, unfortunately.

But it wasn't a bad end to Friday night. It just didn't leave us in the mood to keep hanging around the con to try to grab that one last panel before they closed the con center for the night. So we left.

And that was Friday.

All Otakon 2023 Coverage

Otakon 2023 Day 0 (Thurs) and Day 1 (Friday) - current post

Otakon 2023 Friday cosplay

Otakon 2023 Day 2 (Sat)

Otakon 2023 Saturday cosplay

Otakon 2023 Day 3 (Sun)

Otakon 2023 Sunday cosplay

[krindenium]

Hi All,

I kinda want to do this as future proofing, because i plan to post more in general. So hi, im Krin, im a 20-something Transwomen who uses she/her pronouns. Im a creative in many things who likes talking about random stuff. I do a little writing, ttrpg game designing, art, and more. I am also a ravenous consumer of media. If you have show reccs, send them my way because i need new things to watch, bonus points if they are sapphic/gay/queer in any way.

If you're a prick, dont respect me or other queer people and such, just dont interact with me, i will block you.

This blog does contain some nsfw content, so view at your own discretion.

Im going to try to keep this somewhat organized via tags, but i am kinda new to the posting on social media thing. Tags for sorting through my stuff are

I have a blog for writing now, if you want more writing related stuff and my full stories check out @word-witch-krin

#kelethema is going to be anything specifically about my fantasy world and its creation

#stellar-light is going to be used for my Sci-Fi stuff

#cute girl tower defense bs for anything arknights

#one more for the archive for the nsft stuff or just hornyposting stuff

#Ashes Dust and Devils is for posts related to the fanfic im writing

I hope you enjoy my thoughts, projects, and other random stuff. Stay Hydrated and have a good day.

[bocularteletheric]

I hate you reboots I hate you sequels I hate you franchises I hate you adaptations I hate you prequels I hate you spin offs I hate you live action adaptations I hate you cinematic universes

[iturbide]

🙋‍♀️ Do any irl people know you write fanfic? 🌞 Do you have a preferred time of day to write? 🤯 What’s a genre you struggle with as a writer? ❌ What’s a trope you will never write? 🍆 Do you write the spicy stuffs? If so, what’s your most popular nsfw fic? 😈 Has there been a point in a story where you did something just to be playfully mean to your readers? 🎢 Which of your fics would you call your wildest ride? (Published or not!) 🎃 Do you write fics for certain holidays? Which is your favorite holiday inspired fic? 💔 Is there a fic of yours that broke your heart? 🍦 What’s the sweetest fic you’ve created so far? 👀 Tell me about an up and coming wip please! 🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip? ✨ Give you and your writing a compliment. Go on now. You know you deserve it. 😉 💲 Would you ever open commissions? 🤗 What advice would you give to new fanfic writers that are just getting started?

i'm going to reorganize these just a little for convenience

🙋‍♀️ - Do any irl people know you write fanfic?

I'm going to cheat and say yes because I know @gunhorse IRL and not only does she know full well about my fic-writing, she is a shameless supporter and enabler of it.

🌞 - Do you have a preferred time of day to write?

Generally I prefer to write at night! ...I prefer to do everything at night, honestly. I'm not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination, but I tend to feel most creative when it's darker out.

🤯 - What’s a genre you struggle with as a writer?

To some extent, it depends on the fandom! For Fire Emblem, I struggle with Modern AUs -- modern settings just doesn't have much appeal to me in general, when we're talking about fantasy media. Conversely, I struggle a lot with Sci-Fi AUs for series that have a modern setting like Ace Attorney -- it's not an easy translation to make, given the nature of the media, and sci-fi is not my strongest genre in general (which is not to say that I don't love it, because I do, I'm just not confident with it).

❌ - What’s a trope you will never write?

Romanticized Abuse and any related tropes, particularly Stalking is Love. That stuff is high on my list of things I won't touch with a ten foot pole. Don't expect me to ever portray a Stalker with a Crush sympathetically, either -- there's a reason Robin avoids Tharja in a lot of my works.

🍆 - Do you write the spicy stuffs? If so, what’s your most popular nsfw fic?

yes I write the spicy content and yes I post it. Probably the most popular fic that's straight-up spicy is Greatest Bliss based on hits and kudos, though that's probably by virtue of it being the first one I posted. If we're counting incidental content, though, Crown of Shadows is hands-down champion -- it's my most popular work I've posted period!

😈 - Has there been a point in a story where you did something just to be playfully mean to your readers?

If by 'readers' you mean 'self' (since I write for me first and foremost, the audience is an incidental afterthought), then I might go with the back and forth letters in the last chapter of Affectionately Yours, where the closing gets just a little bit more intimate with every letter until there's the title drop in Robin's last one...and then there's no follow-up letter from Chrom we skip forward a few months and the next thing to come is from Emm. We don't get Chrom's response until the very end, just before the epilogue.

🎢 - Which of your fics would you call your wildest ride? (Published or not!)

That's a tough call...maybe Across Enemy Lines? I really should toss the other five completed chapters up at some point (and finish the last one), but going from the revelation that Robin is actually an assassin sent to kill Chrom, to Chrom finding out about it and Robin blowing his chance at fulfilling his mission, Chrom managing to sort things out with Emm's help, the both of them heading off to Plegia where Robin gets mind controlled by Validar and forced to turn on Chrom, and Chrom trying to save him from the ritual at the Dragon's Table...there are a lot of twists in that one.

🎃 - Do you write fics for certain holidays? Which is your favorite holiday inspired fic?

Generally no -- sometimes I'll make little gift fics that fit a general theme, but since most of my work is based in fantasy worlds that rationally would not have the holidays we do, I prefer not to force that kind of conformity. I will draw inspiration from real-world celebrations, though, like Grima's Night being akin to Halloween in Ylisse and Día de Muertos in Plegia.

💔 - Is there a fic of yours that broke your heart?

Cursed Fate. It's not even a contest -- Chapter 9 in particular destroyed me just in the writing process (and according to some reader testimonies it did the same to them, too, sometimes in public). It still has a happy ending, but the journey there got rough.

🍦 - What’s the sweetest fic you’ve created so far?

Probably United in Song, all things considered. It's just pure fluff: music competition at Garreg Mach? An active dig against the competitive focus of the game? Dorothea and Claude not only having an impromptu duet in the final round, but just hanging out together at the end, making more music just for the joy of it? It doesn't really get much sweeter than that.

(Though I think Affectionately Yours is a close second because that ending is saccharine and I love it.)

💲 - Would you ever open commissions?

I've been on the fence about that for a long time. On the one hand, I've always kind of wanted to do commissions -- there's something really exciting about the idea that someone likes your work enough to ask you for more and support its creation! On the other hand, though, I am notoriously picky about what I write, and my list of 'will not do' content would be a mile long and include a lot of popular ships that people would probably want to ask for. I guess if someone did want to commission me they could ask and I'd be open to discussing it!

🤗 - What advice would you give to new fanfic writers that are just getting started?

Don't hesitate. Just write it. If you have an idea, take the plunge and go for it. The only way to get better is to get started, so don't let your inner critic get in your way. Even if it's rough to begin with, every piece you write will get smoother, and your writing voice will get clearer!

👀 - Tell me about an up and coming wip please!

Okay so I have talked at least in brief about this before (and at some point I am going to go into more detail I just need to extract myself from my reading list and writing Golden Attempt). I'm still very leery about Golden Wildfire and its handling of Claude's character, and I still really like the concept of Claude getting bodyswapped -- but alongside GA, there's another idea I want to explore about his disappearance. Rather than a time-displaced Byleth coming to his rescue, I want to do what amounts to a Fate/Zero crossover because @norbah is a criminal and got me into Fate. Basically, Iskandar is one of Khalid's older half-siblings, though unlike Shahid, they tend to get along well (aside from butting heads about their methods). Iskandar is troubled when Khalid goes missing, not least because it throws their father into a depressive funk -- but when news reaches them that Shahid has died at the hands of someone who looks like Khalid, Iskandar decides to head to Fodlan himself to get to the bottom of this and figure out what happened to his brother.

(And also along the way he meets a scrawny little Imperial mage with something to prove and a self-loathing streak a mile wide and they hit it off so well that Khalid fully intends to tease his brother about making a little friend once he's free and clear of Shambhala.)

🤲 - Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

okay you know I was thinking about picking something from Golden Attempt or maybe Across Enemy Lines but you know what. I brought it up already. How about something Different.

===

“Naga must love you,” she muttered.

“More like-ely she ju...ust doesn’t know eno-ough to hate m-me yet,” he wheezed. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”  He shrugged one shoulder, wisely keeping his split side still.  “You call that an answer?” she demanded, continuing to gently wash away as much of the blood as she could manage.  The bleeding, to her surprise, seemed to have mostly stopped except for a sluggish seep at the very edges of the wound.  “And how else do you explain not being dead and also not bleeding anymore?”

“Elixir,” Robin offered.  “Fro-om Chrom.”

...alright, fine, that would explain a lot.  “Still think you’ve got Naga looking out for you,” she muttered, taking up the staff again. 

“Someone might be-e watching over m...m-me,” he chuckled weakly, “but I si...incerely do-oubt it’s Naga.”

“It’s Naga,” she insisted under her breath as the warm green glow lit the gem in her staff.  And if he tried to reply, it guttered out as the magic started doing its job in knitting him back together.

===

✨ - Give you and your writing a compliment. Go on now. You know you deserve it. 😉

you people are determined to make me compliment myself aren't you

I like to think that I do a good job of making the characters I write feel true to their canon selves even while embellishing them with personal headcanons. I also like what I've done with crossovers, marrying the narrative of one piece of media with the characters and setting of another: I personally consider Heart of the Moon to be one of my stand-out examples (though that may be my folktale bias talking).

✨Fic Writer Emoji Asks✨

[lee-scribbles-and-doodles]

My Top Ten Overlooked Movies With Female Leads In No Particular Order

Note: When you see this emoji (⚠️) I will be talking about things people may find triggering, which are spoilery more often then not. I mention things that I think may count as triggers so that people with them will be aware before going in to watch any of these.

Edited: 3/16/21

Hanna (2011)

So, before I get into why you should watch this movie, I just want to take a moment to say why it's near and dear to my heart. Growing up as a queer kid in the early 2000s, seeing portrayals of people like or similar to myself on anything was rare at best. It was mostly in more "adult" movies or shows that my parents would occasionally let me watch with them that I'd see any lgbtq+ rep at all. Often times they were either walking stereotypes, designed to be buried, evil, or all three.

Then here comes this PG-13 action thriller with a wonderfully written main female lead who, at the time, was close to my age, and who got to kiss another girl (her very first friend, Sophie) on screen in an extremely tender and heartwarming scene. To say the least, it was a life changing moment for me personally.

Now that I've gotten that out of the way, Hanna is a suspenseful movie about a child super-soldier named, you guessed it, Hanna (played by Saoirse Ronan) and her adoptive (?) father Erik Heller (played by Eric Bana) exiting the snowy and isolated wilderness of their home and taking on the shadowy CIA operative, Marissa Wiegler (played by Cate Blanchette) who wants Erik dead and Hanna for herself for mysterious reasons.

It also has an amazing soundtrack by the Chemical Brothers, great action scenes, and it has an over arching fairytale motif, which I'm always a sucker for.

⚠️ Mild blood effects, some painful looking strikes, various character deaths, and child endangerment all feature in this film. However, given its PG-13 rating, a majority of viewers are presumably able to handle this one. Still, be aware of these going in.

Sidenote: It's recently gotten a TV adaptation on Amazon TV, although I have not watched it, and do not know if Hanna and Sophie's romantic/semi-romantic relationship has transferred over.

A Simple Favor

A Simple Favor is a "black-comedy mystery thriller" centered entirely around the relationship between two mothers, the reclusive, rich, mysterious, and regal Emily (played by Blake Lively), and the local recently widowed but plucky mommy blogger, Stephanie (played by Anna Kendrick). When Emily suddenly goes missing, Stephanie takes it upon herself to find out what happened to her new best friend.

It's a fantastic and entertaining movie throughout, with fun, flawed and interesting characters. The relationship between the two female leads is also implied to be at least somewhat romantic in nature, and they even share a kiss.

⚠️ The only major warnings I can think of is that the movie contains an instance of incest and one of the main plotlines revolves around child abuse, although both of these potentially triggering topics are not connected to each other, so there is thankfully no csa going on.

Edit: I legitimately forgot there was drug use in this movie until now. So, yeah, if that's a trigger, be careful of that.

I Am Mother

I became mildly obsessed with this movie when it came out. I Am Mother is a sci-fi film that centers entirely around a cast of two woman, and a female-adjacent robot who is brought to life on screen with absolutely amazing practical effects.

The plot is such, after an extinction-level event, a lone robot known only as Mother tasks herself with replenishing the human race via artifical means. She begins with the film's main protagonist, Daughter. Years go by as Mother raises her human child and the two prepare for Daughter's first sibling (a brother) to be born. However, on Daughter's 16th birthday, the arrival of an outsider known only as Woman shakes Daughter's entire world view. She begins to question Mother's very nature, as well as what's really going on outside the bunker she and her caretaker call home.

⚠️ This movie features child endangerment and reference to child death.

Lilo and Stitch

When I decided to add a single Disney film to this list I initially thought it was going to be hard but almost immediately my brain went to Lilo and Stitch, and specifically about the relationship between Lilo and Nani.

On the surface, this film is about a lonely little girl accidentally adopting a fugitive alien creature as a "dog," but underneath that the story is also about two orphaned sisters and the older sister's attempts to not let social services tear them apart by stepping up as the younger sister's primary guardian. Despite its seemingly goofy premise, Lilo and Stitch has a very emotional and thoughtful center. It's little wonder how this movie managed to spawn an entire franchise.

Despite the franchise it spawned (or possibly because of it), I often find that Lilo and Stitch is overlooked and many people only remember it for the "little girl adopts an alien as a pet" portion of its plot, and I very rarely see it on people's top 10 Disney lists.

⚠️ This movie could be potentially triggering to people who were separated from their siblings or other family members due to social service intervention. There's also a bit of child endangerment, including a scene where Lilo and Stitch both almost drown.

Nausicaä and the Valley of the Wind

Unlike the above entry, I did struggle a little bit with picking a single Studio Ghibli film. Most media of the Ghibli catalogue have strong, well-written, unique, and interesting female leads so selecting just one seemed like quite the task.

However, I eventually settled on this particular film. In recent months, Princess Nausicaä has become my absolute favorite Ghibli protagonist and I'm absolutely enchanted by the world she lives in.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world overun by giant insects and under threat of a toxic forest and its poisoness spores, Nausicaä must try to protect the Valley of the Wind from invaders as she also tries to understand the science behind the toxic forest and attempts to bridge the gap between the insects and the humans.

For those who have never seen the film, I think Nausicaä's personality can best be described as being similar to OT Luke Skywalker. Both are caring, compassionate, and gentle souls who are able to see the best in nearly anyone or anything. She's an absolutely enthralling protagonist and after rewatching the film again for the first time in well over a decade she has easily become one of my all time favorite protagonists.

Whenever I see people talk about Ghibli films, they rarely mention this one, and when they do mention it, it's often in passing. In my opinion it's a must watch.

⚠️ This movie contains some blood, and the folks who either don't like insects or who have entomophobia may not appreciate the giant bugs running about throughout the movie. (Although most insects do not directly relate to real life bugs, and are fantasy creatures).

A Silent Voice

A Silent Voice is an animated movie adaptation of a manga of the same name. While I've never had the pleasure to read the manga, the movie is phenomenal. It covers topics such a bullying, living in the world with a disability, the desire for atonement, social anxiety, and depression in a well thought out manner that ties itself together through the progression of the relationship between its two leads, Shoya and Shouko. It's also beautifully animated. Although very popular among anime viewers, I've noticed that it's often overlooked by people who watch little to no anime. So I suppose this is me urging non-anime viewers to give this film a chance.

⚠️ As mentioned above, the movie deals with bullying, anxiety, and depression (with this last one including suicidal thoughts and behaviour). If discussion of those topics are triggering to you, than you may want to proceed with caution or skip this movie all together.

In This Corner of The World

Another manga adaptation, this one taking place during WWII-era Japan. In This Corner of The World follows the life of a civilian Japanese woman, Suzu Urano, as she navigates simply living and her new marriage as the wartime invades nearly all aspects of everyday life. I think this movie is a good representation of what it must be like to be living as civilian in a country at war where the fight is sometimes fought on one's own soil. It was also an interesting look into pre-50s Japanese culture in my opinion. It's also beautifully animated featuring an art style I don't see often.

Despite it being well known among anime fans, I never really see it be brought up, even among said anime fans themselves.

Side note: I've seen many WWII dramas centering around civilians but they've almost always been about American or UK civilians. This was the first movie I'd seen that features the perspective of a Japanese civilain.

⚠️ Features the death of a child and limb loss. There's also a disturbing scene featuring a victim of one of the atomic bombs near the end.

Wolf Children: Ame and Yuki

This film follows Hana, a Japan-native woman who fell in love with a magical shape-shifting wolf-man, and her trials with raising their children, who can also magically shape-shift into wolves, on her own. It's a very heartfelt movie about a mother's love and the struggles of doing right by your children when you have limited resources to actively guide and care for them. All the characters feel unique and alive in my opinion. Also, the animation is so good that my sister and I initially mistook it for a Ghibli film.

Again, like the previous two anime entries, I don't see it ever brought up outside of anime circles.

⚠️ There's some child endangerment present in the film, although none of it is the fault of Hana as far as I can remember.

Roman Holiday

Roman Holiday is about the fictional Princess Ann (played by Audrey Hepburn), who while on a whirlwind tour of Europe, finally reaches her breaking point over having her entire life be one big schedule and all her words and actions being rehearsed. In the spur of the moment, she runs away in hopes of experiencing what life is like for other women. Unfortunately, she was previously given a sedative, meaning she doesn't get too far before it takes effect. Fortunately, she is found by the kind reporter Joe Bradley (played by Gregory Peck). Believing her to be drunk and unable to get an address from her (because she has none) he ends up taking her home for safety's sake and allows her to sleep off her suppose drunken stupor. The next day, he realizes who she is, and decides to take her on a fun sight seeing trip across Rome in hopes of getting the big scoop. Along the way, they begin to fall for each other.

This is my favorite black and white, old romance film. I think the relationship between the main characters is absolutely beautiful and I have a lot of fun watching it.

⚠️ I'm not entirely sure what kind of warning this film would need. However, it was released in 1953, so values dissonance will probably be at play for many viewers to at least some extent. For example, early in the film Ann is given sedation drugs by her doctor for her behavior, something that is very unlikely to happen today. Also, Mr Bradley deciding to take Ann home to keep her safe rather than call the police or an ambulance is a very pre-90s decision in my opinion.

[inception30daychallenge]

Inception 30 Day Challenge 2021: New and improved and bearing prizes!

Create a post, whether it be text, art, music, or any other media, using these 39 items as prompts. Feel free to participate in as many or as few of them as you want!

Copy the prompt into the body of the post somewhere and tag your posts with @inception30daychallenge, #inceptiversary, and #inception30daychallenge. Your posts will be reblogged on this blog for everyone to appreciate! 

Remember, you earn one entry for every prompt you fulfill before 11:59 PM EDT on August 8. We’ll hold a raffle then to determine our prize winner(s)! More info can be found in our FAQ.

Prompts below the cut, or at this Google Doc link!

Week 1: Introductions & First Times

Day 01: Your favourite character. 

Day 02: Your favourite quote.

Day 03: Your favourite pairing (romantic and/or platonic).

Day 04: What you thought about Inception after seeing it for the first time. 

Week 2: Arts & Entertainment

Day 05: Your favourite scene.

Day 06: Eames’ favourite and least favourite art styles.

Day 07: If each character was an actor, what genre of films/TV would they be known for?

Day 08: A headcanon about your favourite character.

Day 09: Mal’s favourite song or genre of music.

Day 10: A fic rec!

Day 11: Your ideal crossover between Inception and another piece of media. For example, other characters existing in the Inception universe, or vice versa. 

Week 3: Into The Unknown

Day 12: If you had access to dreamshare technology, what would you do with it?

Day 13: What inspired Yusuf to go into science?

Day 14: What types of magic or superpowers would each character have? 

Day 15: A headcanon about dreamshare.

Day 16: Inception Day! Make anything Inception-related! Take a photo, write a poem, make a meme, sing a tune, whatever you want!

Day 17: A fanart rec! (note: please do not repost art from tumblr artists! just reblog it and tag @inception30daychallenge so we can see it.)

Day 18: Another sci-fi or fantasy concept that would cross interestingly with dreamshare.

Week 4: Gen & Rare Pairs

Day 19: Your favourite rare pair. (If Day 03 was your favourite rare pair, choose a different one!)

Day 20: Who would Ariadne call to bail her out of jail?

Day 21: Who is the best and worst hugger?

Day 22: A friendship headcanon.

Day 23: Cobb’s post-canon online dating profile.

Day 24: Another type of rec! (meta, podfic, fanvid, edit, meme, blog, whatever!)

Day 25: Your favourite side character (i.e. not on the dream team).

Week 5: On The Go

Day 26: If you had to fly from Sydney to Los Angeles, which character would you want to fly with? What would you talk about?

Day 27: Arthur’s travelling pet peeve.

Day 28: If each character was a method of transportation, what would they be?

Day 29: A team headcanon.

Day 30: Saito’s favourite place to travel to.

Day 31: A self-rec! (anything from art to a funny Tumblr post you made!)

Day 32 (Aug 1): Your favourite movie setting.

Week 6: Days of Future Past

Day 33: Would you rather watch an Inception prequel or sequel? Who should it be centred on?

Day 34: How is Fischer’s life affected by the inception?

Day 35: What was each character’s favourite subject in school?

Day 36: A random pre-canon headcanon.

Day 37: What do Phillipa and James do when they grow up? Do they join dreamshare? 

Day 38: What would your role on a dreamshare team be, and why? (i.e. Extractor, Point Man, Architect, Forger, Chemist, Shade, or Tourist)

Day 39: A letter to Inception fandom.

[canonicallyanxious]

i was tagged by @thelibraryiscool for a couple of bookish related things and they looked like great fun but i completely forgot to do them until now skdjnfskdjnfs so combining into one post to kill two birds with one stone!

tagging: @tristealven @persimmonyms @boxesfullofthoughts @pronouncingitwang @kapplebougher @florawelch​ @homomrdarcy @braveveth - feel free to do one or both or none of the above!

rules: spell out either your name or username using only books or only movies that have your vibe, and tag some people.

[i did for a hot second consider doing my username for more letter options but i decided i was not about to suffer through the trials of trying to remember literally any book that starts with the letter x also obviously i’m doing books because movies what are those?????]

A Secret History by Donna Tartt [this game asked for vibes, not my favorite books, and unfortunately an incredibly pretentious story about murderous gay-coded classics majors is exactly 100% my vibe]

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Saenz

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

Another Country by James Baldwin

Her Body and Other Parties: Stories by Carmen Maria Machado

-

#54321 Challenge

5 books I’m loving/have loved: [I’m assuming this means recently??? unfortunately i have not had the brain cells for reading as of late so i’m just going to name all the new novels i’ve read this year that i loved which does happen to be exactly 5 lol]

The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo

The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson [love Baru Cormorant, would love to actually fuckin finish the fuckin sequels one day]

The Thirty Names of Night by Zeyn Joukhadar

Butter Honey Pig Bread by Francesca Ekwuyasi

Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

4 auto-buy authors: [i find this rather challenging bc I honestly don’t really have favorite authors and the number of authors whose works i have all read and enjoyed is very, very low so i guess i will just list some authors that always make me perk up when i see them around]

Roxane Gay

Celeste Ng

Tamsyn Muir [whom I also know as UrbanAnchorite but that’s neither here nor there]

Ann Leckie

3 genres I love: [also a prompt i find challenging skdjnfsdkjnfs i will give pretty much any genre a stab if it’s well written but i gave this my best shot]

urban fantasy

coming of age [does this count as a genre???? it does now]

sci-fi [i tend to prefer sci-fi on the softer side or stories that are not fully sci-fi but have sci-fi elements but harder sci-fi can be great fun too. i almost put cyberpunk as a genre but i realized i like cyberpunk better in visual media than as a literary genre lol]

2 places I love to read: 

Near a body of water, preferably with shade and a decent seat that won’t give me a back ache [will take: beaches, poolsides, river banks, boats on the ocean, puddles of rain, etc.]

In a city I don’t live in, preferably while traveling by myself or at a quiet cafe or park where no one will bother me

1 book/series I promised to read: 

Middlemarch by George Elliot, which is more of a promise to myself than anything else. I have had this book in my backlog for a year and a half now since i first started reading it. i don’t want to talk about it.

[cheri-translates]

[CN] Victor’s R&S - Six out of Seventeen (Eng Translation)

🍒This R&S (“十七分之六”) will not be released in EN or any server as it’s one of the cancelled R&S which came with the Dream Heart Lake gacha event!🍒

This is a full translation, so you can follow along with the narrator if you want to!

Summary: Victor has been persistent in one thing for seventeen years. The part he lets other people know about is simply six out of seventeen. 

Other cancelled Victor R&S:

> flashback 

> paradise on earth 

> so-called disparity

[ Chapter 1 ]

The first time he recognised his powerlessness was during that failed escape.

The second time was the sense of loss when his mother passed away.

The third time was when he faced the boundless sea of faces, at his wit’s end.

Victor will not say that he searched unceasingly for the girl for seventeen years.

--

It’s akin to how people talk about being secretly in love: Although they might say “I’ve harboured a crush on him/her for so many years”, “I’ve continued following him/her on social media all these years”, ultimately, they will not delay the things they have to do.

To Victor, “finding the girl” had a similar concept.

He will not enumerate how many hours and minutes he spent on this matter of “finding the girl”. One, there was no point in doing so. Two, he was slightly worried - what if he discovered that the problem which had been entrenched in his heart for such a long time was actually very trivial... what would he do then?

However--

It’s akin to how people talk about being secretly in love: Although he had no idea how the other party looked like now, the palpitations from back then, and the blurred face in his dreams always motivated him to press onward. Exactly because he couldn’t set it down, it turned into a permanent, clear moonlight in his heart.

To Victor, “finding the girl” remained the same as always - this matter was on track, even after he established his business. 

After all, Victor was only eleven years old when the incident happened. As a young student, his abilities were limited. At the time, all he could do after school was check in on places the girl would often visit, but his investigations didn’t go smoothly. On one hand, his understanding of the girl was already extremely limited. On other other hand, the inside story of what happened during the orphanage incident was undisclosed. 

He could have received some measure of support from his parents if he asked. But after going through the kidnapping, Victor understood that it would be better if fewer people knew about his superpower. 

He wasn’t afraid his parents wouldn’t believe him. It was just that he was afraid his parents may get “implicated” in his personal secret. What if they ended up like the girl...

This was the reason why teenage Victor chose to delay the matter of “finding the girl” - not give up, but delay it. 

At that age, Victor already understood the importance of preparation. In the years ahead, he was a good student in the eyes of teachers, a good student who looked as though he was perpetually in a bad mood, taciturn, and a bit heavy-hearted. 

Even till he graduated from high school, none of his schoolmates knew about the kidnapping Victor experienced in childhood, and nobody knew that he had been continuously collecting materials related to back then. However, his roommates all knew that a girl’s name would occasionally surface when he talked in his sleep.

It’s thanks to this that nobody ever spread rumours about the girl. At an age where everybody loved to joke at another’s expense, nobody ever used Victor as a joke. 

--

[ Chapter 2 ]

The first year Victor entered university was also the time social networking gained traction. 

The reason why his business could develop at such a rapid pace was to a large extent attributed to social networking, which gave rise to the theory of Six Degrees of Separation.

Unfortunately, the social networking which helped Victor establish his business was unable to provide much assistance in “that matter”.

It wasn’t that Victor didn’t search for posts pertaining to the orphanage incident, but the content was mostly meant to attract attention. 

--

Some who were steeped in fantasy said that the orphanage incident back then was the result of vampires causing trouble, and the orphans discovered in it were actually sustenance reserves for the vampires. Some who were more realistic made an analysis and claimed that it was a relatively large-scale child trafficking situation. Some who were inclined towards sci-fi asserted that it was an attack launched by aliens who had plans to take the children back to their planet to conduct experiments...

While Victor felt disappointed by such results, they were within his expectations. After all, the official materials which were disclosed back then were already limited to begin with, and the other children who were involved were too young, and lacked as clear a memory as he did - after being rescued, they had high fevers and may have even thought everything was simply a dream.

To Victor, all these arguments confirmed his deductions: He couldn’t use layman methods to find her. 

As such, Victor hired a private investigator in the year he graduated from university. 

Contrary to popular belief, private investigators existed among the people in the city.

It’s just that they generally had a different identity, and it was difficult to find them without a recommendation from someone else. Victor managed to locate this private investigator from a recommendation by one of his men. At that point, LFG had already established itself to a certain level. When the detective, whose surname is Bao, heard from the middleman that LFG’s Victor was looking for him, his first reaction was -

“CEO Victor, we have to make something clear. If this has to do with a company-related scheme, I don’t wade in such muddy waters.”

“Teacher Bao.” Addressing him as “teacher” was part of his upbringing and etiquette. However, the sentence which followed after was far from polite. “Do you know about the kidnapping incident which occurred in the orphanage eleven years ago?

He asked the other party to investigate the truth of what happened back then, along with an open reason - as a victim of the incident, he had the right to know. 

“CEO Victor, telling me about this right after we just met... does this count as you having trust in me?”

“CEO Liang recommended you, and I trust him.”

Without saying anything else, Victor and Detective Bao agreed on a quarterly report, and then sent him out politely.

On the night of the conversation, the old detective received a payment much higher than the agreed remuneration. Only then did he believe that the guy he saw in the afternoon was truly what CEO Liang called an “awe-inspiring business elite”.

And he experienced the shrewdness of this “business elite” when he presented his first report three months later. 

--

[ Chapter 3 ]

That day, Old Bao gave a voluminous speech spanning a full hour, thinking Victor would give one or two phrases of praise. Even a nod would have sufficed. However, he didn’t expect that after listening to the report, all Victor did was to move his fingers.

Victor’s slender fingers curled inwards, and he pointed towards a box in the corner.

“CEO Victor, this is?”

Ever since he withdrew from the media, Old Bao had not experienced many great storms. But he would never forget the answer Victor gave him. He said it lightly, but it could cause the listener to vomit three litres of blood.

“You’ve passed the test.”

It turns out that the box contained all the materials Victor collected over the years - some official and some not. 90% of the content was mentioned in Old Bao’s report - and that was what Victor based his “you’ve passed the test” on.

Because most of his clients were introduced by friends, goodwill was a guarantee provided by the middleman, which was why most of the transactions could be settled during the first meeting. But for someone like Victor...

It was the first time Old Bao met such a person.

So, he had been busying himself for nothing over the past three months? This report was basically just a test for him set up by Victor?

There was a particular moment when Old Bao really wanted to walk straight out the door. But for some inexplicable reason, this idea was throttled to death at the cradle.

Perhaps it was curiously. Perhaps it was the gut instinct of a detective--

He wanted to know what exactly Victor wanted to search for - to the extent that he didn’t hesitate to waste three months’ worth of time.

Thus, on such a foundation, their partnership commenced.

If it was because of curiosity at the beginning, a moment of impulse was what prevented Old Bao from rejecting this business. If he were to persevere, he had to find a motivation to tide him through long-term. After all, Old Bao would sometimes ask himself: 

Why did he make the “humiliating” decision to provide his services to Victor? Purely out of curiosity? That was enough to cause him to throw his pride away? Isn’t his time also time?

Fortunately, every time Old Bao questioned his life, remuneration would be funnelled into his bank account, helping him find a new direction in his lost state.

Apart from this, having a new understanding of Victor was also another reason why Old Bai eventually made steady progress. 

If he were to label Victor at the very beginning, it would be “taciturn”, “stern”, “proud and formidable”. After the first report, a few more labels would be added - “shrewd”, “meticulous” and “deserving to be called an elite”. However, as they interacted for a longer time...

Most of these were torn down by Old Bao himself.

After working with him for a year, he deduced that Victor’s patience and temper were actually much better than what he expressed on his face. Even though there was little progress in his investigation most of the time, he didn’t receive the severe criticism he expected, and the agreed-upon remuneration didn’t diminish because of it. 

Faced with one after another of disappointing reports, Victor’s response would just be a few words, in keeping with his style -

Definite and decisive, resolute and persistent. 

--

[ Chapter 4 ]

Sometimes, an inner struggle would surface in Old Bao’s mind: Could Victor have known that the girl was actually no longer on this earth, and his way of searching for a needle in a haystack was a form of coping? If that was the case, he’d just have to cooperate with Victor in acting out this charade, and he’d be able to earn a lot of money.

No, no, you can’t lack a conscience, especially as a detective. Since I’ve already accepted his money, I should carry out his work properly. 

After three years of working with him, Old Bao felt as though he had waded into far muddier and complicated waters than a company-related scheme - clues to finding the girl were cut a few times. But as he dived further into the orphanage incident, a few questions started to be brought to the surface:

If the girl simply died in the accident, why was it that apart from her death certificate, most of her information had gone missing? If the kidnapping at the orphanage was just a simple incident, why did most of the people related to it vanish?

The overly conscious effort to cover up the matter could instead prove a few truths. For instance, there were huge stakes behind the orphanage kidnapping. For instance... that girl could still be alive, just that she had gone incognito and has had a change in identity.

After six years of working together, Old Bao finally fiound a key piece of information. 

At the same time, he also understood the necessity of the test back then. When Victor told Old Bao his true objective, it was essentially entrusting his biggest secret into the hands of a stranger. 

Old Bao examined himself. If he were in Victor’s position, he wouldn’t have been able to do it better than Victor did.

Old Bao suddenly understood why CEO Liang, who had only worked with Victor a few times, was so full of praise for Victor back then.

Since he had found important information, following the clues would be a quick task. Old Bao knew that their employer-employee relationship would not continue for much longer. With regards to this, he had mixed feelings. 

One one hand, he felt as though a huge weight was lifted off his shoulders. After being troubled by this issue for so long, there was finally a clue. On the other hand... he was reluctant to let go - after all, it had been a full six years.

He didn’t know whether he’d be able to meet someone as remarkable and talented as Victor in the future.

Such an appreciation transcended gender and age. It was a natural inclination humans have towards good things.

At the same time, he also hoped that Victor’s future could be smooth-sailing, and that he wouldn’t need to look for people like him to resolve troublesome matters.

This was a sincere blessing from a member of the older generation to a member of the younger generation.

As Old Bao tackled with this secret inner struggle, it was truly “speaking of the devil”. His phone screen lit up, and he received a new message, the contents containing only eight words:

“Investigate HBS. We will talk in detail tomorrow.”

“This person, he’s really...”

Without even looking at the sender, Old Bao already knew who this message was from. He felt an uncontrollable smile inch up his lips. Old Bao shook his head resignedly, and he didn’t know if he was mocking himself or feeling rueful. He continued.

“Really... very contradictory.”

-

Other cancelled R&S: here

Lucien’s cancelled R&S (by other user): here

[tardis-stowaway]

hi! I really like your taste in media, and I'm looking for new summer reading - if it's not too much trouble to share, do you have any like, top 5 book recommendations? or maybe some books you've read recently that you enjoy? any genre is fine, including nonfiction. thank you!

Hi anon! This was a really nice message to get, so thank you!!! :D Lately, I haven’t been reading as much as I usually like due to a combination of grad school and pandemic brain, but here is a list of five books I adore that I’ve discovered in the past several years, plus a bonus older series that I wish got more attention. I tried to give some variety of different sorts of books. This got a bit long. I have a lot to say about the books I love!

-The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison: this is a wonderful comfort-read fantasy with a main character who I love and would protect with my life. The worldbuilding is rich (there’s formal and informal pronouns!) with some fascinating touches. It’s the story of the half-goblin youngest son of an elven emperor, raised away from court and out of favor, who unexpectedly gets the throne when his father and older brothers are killed in an airship crash. Can this shy, anxious young man solve the mystery of his father's death and hold onto his throne without losing his gentle, empathetic nature?

-The Murderbot Diaries series by Martha Wells, beginning with All Systems Red: super fun science fiction with a page-turning plot and an oh-so relatable, snarky narrator. Murderbot is a security construct who has hacked itself and just wants to use its new freedom of mind to watch media in peace, but the pesky humans around it keep needing rescuing, and there’s some evil corporate shenanigans going on. This is a series of several novellas and one full-length novel.

-The Invisible Library series by Genevieve Cogman, beginning with the book of the same name: these books are romps packed full of things that I love. Librarians wielding language as magic! Witty banter! Dragons! The Fae! Parallel worlds! A Sherlock Holmes-esque detective! Heists! Steampunk! Intrigue! A creepy villain! Likable characters at the center hold everything together.

-The Refrigerator Monologues by Catherynne Valente: you know the “women in refrigerators” trope folks complain about from comics and other dude-centered media? The premise of this book is that a group of women who were connected in some way to superheroes (sometimes they’re the un-powered girlfriends, sometimes they’re superpowered themselves) getting together in the afterlife to tell the stories of their own lives, how they are complex people who are more than how they suffered for some man’s journey. This book is angry and sorrowful, but also engaging, motivating and even funny in parts. Catherynne Valente’s prose is always astounding. If superheroes aren’t your jam, try her wise and whimsical middle-grade portal fantasy The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making or her “Eurovision in space to save the world” Douglas Adams-esque novel Space Opera.

—The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal: alt-history sci-fi with an intersectional social justice lens. An asteroid strike in the early 1950s prompts an international effort to radically accelerate the space program. The protagonist is a woman pilot trying to become an astronaut. The author has done a TON of research into the actual history of space travel and it shows. This is sort of what you’d get if you crossed The Martian with Hidden Figures and threw in a major natural disaster. Note that this is part of trilogy. I’ve only read the first two, but I’ve heard only good things about the third.

-Bonus old favorite: The Blood and Smoke series by Tanya Huff: urban fantasy that will appeal to fans of Buffy, among other things. The Blood books center on Vicky Nelson, a tough and stubborn PI who gets drawn in to dealing with the supernatural when she meets vampire Henry Fitzroy (bastard son of Henry VIII, short, charismatic, bisexual vampire…I love Henry so much). The Smoke books, which I love even more, center on Tony, a minor character in the Blood books who has moved on to get a job on the crew of a vampire detective TV show. These books are creepy, exciting, snarky, and have pretty good queer rep. (Henry’s bi, Tony’s gay and has a super cute canon romantic plotline in the Smoke books). They’re a bit dated, especially the earlier Blood books from the early 90s, but considering their age their take on a lot of the urban fantasy tropes feels quite fresh. More people need to read these and then post Tony/Lee fics on AO3 for me to enjoy. You can start with either Blood Ties, the first overall, or skip to the Smoke series with Smoke and Shadows.

The long list of books I also considered including: Gideon the Ninth by Tamsin Muir, the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire (really, almost anything by Seanan), The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi, A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan, Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik, and All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders.

Happy reading, anon! I'm happy to talk about books (almost) any time.

[twentiethcenturymoviesandtv]

The Princess Bride: A Product of the Times

The 1980s were an age of surplus in terms of just about everything.  From the music and clothes to the explosions on screen, the 1980s were a clear example of excess, of wealth of ideas and resources, and nowhere was it more obvious than in the movie industry.

From teen films to comedies to blockbuster action extravaganzas, the 1980s movie industry, led by directors like Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Richard Donner and more, brought a combination style of ‘throwback’ + innovation to many of their films.  Movies like Star Wars and Indiana Jones directly imitated and updated sci-fi and adventure serials from Spielberg and George Lucas’s youth, whereas films like Joe Dante’s Gremlins poked fun at ‘50s B-Movie horror movies. John Carpenter’s The Thing provided an updated look at a classic monster flick, and his The Fog called back to plenty older ghost stories, while making something new of his own.  Although the 1980s was a period of exploration in film, with new genres being pioneered and explored in different directions, part of that exploration included looking backward and experimenting with previously existing genres, with the up and coming generation of ‘Movie Brat’ directors choosing to play with elements they’d grown up knowing and loving themselves.

That extended to the fantasy genre.

From the pulpy style of the Low Fantasy Conan the Barbarian films to the magical feeling of movies like Labyrinth or Willow, the 1980s theaters experienced a major boom in terms of fantasy films, experiencing varying levels of success.  From Excalibur to Legend, these new fantasy films took risks with special effects, methods of storytelling, and styles of characters (although lots of them became known as Cliche Storms).   These movies utilized unique spins on fairy-tale stories and legends, updating and modernizing aspects of them and either making them darker, or finding new ways to acknowledge the fantastical elements of the story.

Most interesting is that, in the 1980s, the fantasy genre didn’t have a whole lot of history to draw from.

Unlike the B-Sci-Fi flicks from the ‘50s or the Creature Features, or even the adventure serials that would go on to spark Indiana Jones, there wasn’t a lot of previous canon in the fantasy genre.  Films like The Wizard of Oz, which were landmarks in the genre, didn’t have a whole lot of obvious influence on the sword-and-sorcery films that came afterwards.

Now, you may be asking why all of this matters.  Or why any of it matters, in fact.

Here’s the thing: no film is an island.  Every movie, (some more than others) is directly influenced by the culture it exists in, and the pool of resources that have come before it, especially in the cases of the films directly designed to emulate genres or specific movies that have already been made.

And that certainly seems to have been the case, at least partially, as far as The Princess Bride is concerned.

Despite being released in the 1980s, with the original book by William Goldman written in 1973, The Princess Bride doesn’t wholly read like it’s contemporaries in the fantasy genre.  If you watch it alongside the likes of Ladyhawke, Labyrinth, and Legend, you’ll find that more about the film stands out other than not following my alliterative pattern.

In many of the other fairy-tale-esque stories populating Hollywood during this decade, the characters talk and act very much like they are in a very grand story.  There is gravity to the situation and most of the characters, (exception being some of the creatures in Labyrinth) and the story is typically an epic one.

The Princess Bride, on the other hand, manages to avoid this tone and story structure, by including a very traditional fairy-tale plot: save the princess from the evil prince, but by going about it using styles more typical of a different era entirely.

Rather than using the fantasy, action, or even adventure styles traditionally used by the 1980s, The Princess Bride utilized something a little earlier: the swashbuckling style of the 1930s.

Due to the way that the story and characters are written (with a sharp, sly, tongue-in-cheek edge), The Princess Bride cannot be played as a straight fantasy film (check out the Genre article to hear more), and while it does retain plenty of the 1980s charm about it, it also uses the fast-dialogue and witty humor found in stories like The Adventures of Robin Hood and other swashbuckler stories from that decade of adventure films.  Watching the fencing match between Inigo Montoya and Westley is eerily similar to many such fight scenes in older action-adventure movies, and listening to the dialogue during this and other sequences, the humorous tone with dry, quick wit, is also an echo of older screwball-style dialogue.

Whether this was intentional or not, the fact is, this makes The Princess Bride’s style very fresh and new in the middle of the fantasy boom of the 1980s.  It also had a very interesting side effect:

It made The Princess Bride ‘timeless’.

The idea of something being ‘timeless’ is an interesting topic in the film world.  

The word ‘timeless’ is best defined as ‘not affected by the passage of time or changes in fashion’.  It carries the implication that, applied to film, a ‘timeless’ movie would be one totally understandable and relatable years after the culture has changed.  Carried further, the ideal ‘timeless’ movie would be one with no cultural identity of its own, completely orphaned from the original context that the story originated in.  In other words, this is a story that can be enjoyed no matter how much time has passed.  Typically, this word gets applied to period stories, sci-fi films, or fantasies: stories not set in the contemporary time period.  

In direct contrast, of course, the word ‘dated’ is simply used to apply to anything created in a discernible time period.  This word typically carries the connotation of ‘old-fashioned’.  This word’s connotation is that, (applied to film) a ‘dated’ film is one that is less understandable by those looking from outside that particular culture or time period.  This would be a film that hasn’t ‘aged well’, most often describing contemporary films of the day.

So, here’s the thing.

These definitions, while technically correct, are far more complex than this in the film world.  

By the dictionary definition, no film is truly timeless.  Every film is a product of the times they were created in, because people who lived in those times created them.  Every movie, every piece of media are products of the times they are from, but they are not defined by them.  A film is not ‘dated’ because it shows the culture, or the technology of its time, or uses that technology when trying to create the world of the movie itself.  A movie is not dated because it uses puppets instead of CGI.  

As I mentioned, a film is considered ‘dated’ in a true sense if it is less understandable or enjoyable in hindsight, from a place outside of that specific culture.  Less easily overlooked are ideas, and here’s what truly does date a movie.

It really doesn’t matter if a film is made in the ‘70s and set in the far future, or made in the ‘50s and set in the distant past, because quite frankly, the movie is still being made in that decade.  As a result, even period films end up carrying the thumbprint of the contemporary ideas of the people who made it.  Indiana Jones is best remembered as an ‘80s style action hero because although his films are set in the 1930s and made in the style of adventure serials from that time period, the style of action and characterization was very current, in order to update the genre.

The ideas and thematic core of a film, how certain topics and characters are treated and viewed, both in universe and in the narrative, can be what truly dates a film, even if it has none of the recognizable trimmings like a tie-dye shirt, and here’s where we can tread into good vs. bad territory: because while in some cases, the ideas can be pleasantly positive, in others, the opinions presented by the filmmakers can be rather uncomfortable to modern audiences.

So, all of this is to lead us to an important question:

Is The Princess Bride timeless, or at least, as timeless as movies can get?

Well, some would argue no.

A glaring problem with modern movie-goers is the character of Buttercup, who, as I mentioned in the ‘Characters’ article, really doesn’t do much apart from getting passed-around, fought over and protected.  Admittedly, especially to a generation used to Princess Leias, Marion Ravenwoods, and even Lilis, Buttercup seems largely useless, relegating the only woman of the film (aside from Valerie, Miracle Max’s wife) to a plot device, an object without much personality.

To a lot of moviegoers, this is pretty blatantly bad representation: there are two named women in the movie, and one of them has less than five minutes of screen time, and the other essentially exists as nothing other than the title of the film.  The film also employs a distinctly monochrome cast, another element that can lead to people pointing to a different era of Hollywood, one that didn’t tend to focus on that kind of representation, or in the case of Buttercup, borderline problematic representation.  

There are other moments of issues: Westley’s line about ‘there are penalties when a woman lies’ and his berating her for ‘moving on’ and getting married when she’d long thought him dead might rub modern moviegoers the wrong way.

In the end, though, is this…a problem?  A detriment to enjoyment of the movie as a whole?  Do these elements actively work against the movie in a modern environment?

Well…yes and no.

It is true that now, films are making an active step towards more diverse representation, and that is certainly a good thing.  Many movies now are also including more female characters with stronger characters than the distressed plot-devices of old.  Heck, even other movies of the 1980s were instituting more ethnic diversity and female characters with more agency in films like Aliens, Baby Boom, The Color Purple and Willow.  

Looking back, it can be easy to wince at those moments in The Princess Bride and make the assumption that the film was just being outdated because of when it was made, or due to the ‘fantasy’ period, or even because it’s deliberately utilizing story elements from 1930s films, but in the end, those elements don’t actively hurt the narrative.

Female characters don’t have to be sword-wielders like Sorsha from Willow, or Silk-Hiding-Steel like Isabeau from Ladyhawke.  Princesses don’t have to always take over their own rescues.  In the end, there’s more support for female characters in the variety offered by the 1980s rather than the eradication of any weak female characters whatsoever, because as it turns out, some women are weak, just as some are strong.  (It would have been nice if the weak character wasn’t the only female one, though.)

Is The Princess Bride progressive?  Well, no, not really, but it’s not regressive, either.  It doesn’t actively serve as detriment to the film to notice these things, not in the same way that other movies experience backlash for outright sexist and racist content.  As it stands, The Princess Bride is an excellent movie that manages to stand the test of time because it is so ridiculously fairy-tale-esque.  As I said before, the old-fashioned story and dialogue paired with the budget and technology of a 1980s film (except for the ROUS, which is charmingly unbelievable) manages to create something similar to George Lucas’s Star Wars trilogy: a film that is as removed from its cultural context as a piece of media can be (aside from the Grandson’s bedroom decor).

It is potentially largely this element, this aspect of borderline ‘timelessness’ that has allowed The Princess Bride to stand as a forgotten, overlooked classic for over thirty years.  That, combined with the genuine warmth, humor, and passion of the film itself, will allow it to continue to stand for far longer, as long as we keep telling our children fairy-tales.

Don’t forget to leave a comment, like, or some other form of love if you enjoyed this analysis, and please, follow for more articles like this!  Thanks so much for reading, and I hope to see you in the next article.

[ellie-mnop]

Hi everyone! I just finished the 100 Days Of Languages challenge and I wanted to do something new afterwards, so I came up with a challenge of my own! I’m calling this the Checkerboard Challenge because it’s an 8x8 grid. Along the top there are eight language-related skills, and on the side there are eight modes of learning, so each box contains a way to study a particular skill using a particular mode. I wanted to do that because exposing yourself to the same information in different contexts is so helpful for learning and I wanted to apply that to how I study Portuguese. The result is a list of 64 different ways to study languages, 71 if you include the alternate options listed below, each one versatile enough to be repeated as often as you want using different topics or resources and hopefully interesting and useful for your learning.

Ways To Use This Challenge

Complete all of the challenges on the table, in whatever order you want.

Choose a particular skill you’d like to work on. Complete all of the challenges in that column.

Choose a particular method of learning that works well for you. Complete all of the challenges in that row.

Use dice or a random number generator to pick a challenge to do every day, and see how long it takes you to get bingo or connect four or something.

Choose whichever of the challenges sound useful to you and incorporate them into your regular studying routine.

There’s no obligation to post anything you make; even when I say to record yourself doing something, that can just be for your own future reference. (It’s recommended for the collaborative tasks that focus on creating resources that would be useful to other learners or interacting on social media, but even then you can just write the posts/comments and not post them if you prefer) However, I would love to see anything you do want to share, or any updates on your progress, so you can post anything like that with the tag “checkerboard challenge” which is also where I will be posting the tasks I complete.

The tasks are listed below, with more detail than what would fit in the boxes.

Reading

(Visual) Read a comic book, comic strip, or webcomic in your target language. Depending on your skill level and  the amount of time you have, you can choose anything from a single strip of a  newspaper comic to a full-length graphic novel

(Auditory) Read along with a chapter of an audiobook, or another piece of writing with accompanying audio. Some language learning websites have articles with recordings of native speakers  reading them. If you want, or if you can’t find anything else, you could even  use a song and its lyrics.

(Hands-On) Option 1: Play a video game in your target language. This can be a computer or console game, or an app on your phone or even a  little browser game. Check the language options on games you already have to  see if your target language is available, or if not, many free games have lots of language options. / Option 2: Read and follow a recipe or another  set  of instructions, such as an art/craft tutorial, the rules to a board or card game, a DIY project or a magic trick.

(Logical) Solve  riddles or logic puzzles in your target language. (Alternate:  Read a short mystery story such as a minute mystery (or something longer if  you prefer) and see if you can solve it before the characters do.)

(Collaborative) Talk by text chat with someone else learning your target language, or a native speaker learning your language.

(Read/Write) Read an article or a chapter of a book  (or the whole thing) in your target language. It can be about any topic, and can be a children’s or adult’s book depending on your skill level and preference.

(Personal) Find and read a translation of a piece of writing that’s important to you, such as your favorite book as a kid that you feel nostalgic for, or a poem  that resonates with you.

(Creative) Read story in your target language and illustrate what happens. The quality of the drawing isn’t important unless you want it to be; the important thing is to help you process what you’re reading.

Writing

(Visual) Choose a photo, either at random from a generator or by choice on a website like Unsplash, and describe it in as much detail as  you can. Your description can focus just on describing visible details in the image, or you can make up contexts for and stories around the things you see, whichever you prefer. (Alternate: Do this with a physical object nearby instead of a photo.)

(Auditory) Try writing simple poems, focusing on the auditory features of what you’re writing such as rhyme and rhythm. You can use a rhyme dictionary to expand your vocabulary in an interesting  way while you’re working on this. It’s not necessary to worry too much about  the artistic quality of the poems unless you want to.

(Hands-On) Write instructions for how to do something you know how to do, such as recipe, a life skill, a game  or sport, an art of craft project, or even your method of language learning.

(Logical) Create a persuasive piece of writing that logically argues a point. It doesn’t have to be about a serious or controversial topic. For example, you can defend your prediction for the next season of your favorite show, or what would happen if some fantasy or sci-fi concept were real (maybe a good  way to practice the conditional tense if you’re studying a language that has one), or why your best friend is awesome.

(Collaborative) Use  a language learning social media app like HelloTalk. Comment on posts and  make your own.

(Read/Write) Write a summary of something you’ve read in your target language. You can either read in your native language and summarize in your target language, or do both parts in your target language.

(Personal) Write a journal entry in your target language, talking about how your day or week has been or what you are thinking and feeling. (Alternate: Write about one of your memories.)

(Creative) Write a small story in your target language. It can be about whatever you want, and it doesn’t have to be very long or detailed. You can (option 1) write it as prose, which could be better to practice description and narration or to focus on a particular verb tense, or in (option 2) a script style which could be better to practice conversational language.

Listening

(Visual) Watch a video with narration that describes it, such as a nature documentary, an instructional  video such as a cooking video, or a video reviewing something.

(Auditory) Find an online stream of a radio station. Pay attention to both the music and what the announcers say.

(Hands-On) Watch a video demonstrating a craft project, recipe or other task and follow the instructions.

(Logical) Watch or listen to a mystery story and try to solve it before the characters do. This can be a whole movie or novel-length audiobook if you want, but it doesn’t have to be; even an  episode of something like Scooby Doo should work.

(Collaborative) Exchange audio with someone else learning your target language, or a native speaker learning your language.

(Read/Write) Watch a video or listen to a piece of audio and take notes on what you learn.

(Personal) Watch a dub of a piece of media you are familiar with, such as your favorite childhood movie.

(Creative) Option 1: Listen to a story or other piece of audio and  illustrate it. / Option 2: Listen to a song and make up a new verse.

Speaking

(Visual) Make a video of yourself showing something and talking about it, for  example a tour of your home or neighborhood, a review of something, or a video about your pet.

(Auditory) Listen to a piece of audio and try to repeat what you hear. You don’t have to pause  after every word and repeat it, it’s probably better to go at least sentence  by sentence or with parts even longer so you can keep things in context.

(Hands-On) Explain to someone, or record yourself explaining, how to do something, possibly while demonstrating.

(Logical) Record  yourself explaining, and possibly demonstrating, how something works, such as a science concept.

(Collaborative) Record yourself explaining a concept you’re learning, like a grammar topic or how to use a particular word.

(Read/Write) Read out loud and record yourself.

(Personal) Make a recording of yourself talking about something that’s important to you  or a memory or anecdote you have. (Alternate: Make a vlog entry (even if you don’t have a vlog to put it on) talking about your day.)

(Creative) Record yourself telling a story, or tell one in person to someone.

Vocabulary (Most of these, with the exception of the first two, can be done with any vocabulary list you want.)

(Visual) Choose a page from a visual dictionary to study. One way you can do this is by studying the words and then covering  the labels with sticky notes or whiting them out on a copy and trying to fill in the blanks.

(Auditory) Choose  a song in your target language, and look up and study any unfamiliar words in it.

(Hands-On) Option 1: Use your vocabulary list as a scavenger hunt list. This works well if you have a lot of nouns and adjectives on the list. For everyday household items, you can look for the literal items on the list, while if they’re more obscure you can look for pictures or other representations of them. / Option 2: Act out the words on your list. This works well for verbs and adverbs, as well as more abstract  nouns or adjectives like emotions. You can record video of yourself doing this and later look back at the video to try to guess the words.

(Logical) Option 1: Make a crossword puzzle using your vocab list. If you write the words and clues, there are tools online that will build the puzzle itself for you, or you can do that by hand on graph paper if you prefer. You can either wait a while and then solve your own puzzle to see how much you remember, or give it to another language learner to solve an ask them to make one for you to solve. / Option 2: Look into the etymological history of the words to find out why they mean what they mean and whether they have any connections to words in your own language.

(Collaborative) Create a vocab list post around a theme, including words you are studying as well as any related words you already know. Include any resources that you think  would be useful to someone using the list, such as sample sentences, pictures, or whatever else you want.

(Read/Write) Try to write a small story or other piece of writing using as many of your vocab words as you can.

(Personal) Write  a sentence about what you think of each thing on your vocabulary list.

(Creative) Try to write an interesting sentence using each word on your vocabulary list. (Alternate: Illustrate each word on your vocabulary list. You can do this on index cards if you want, to make illustrated flash cards.)

Grammar

(Visual) Create a color or shape coded system to classify a concept like verb tenses or noun gender. For example, you can read  through a piece of text and highlight all of the verbs using a different color for each tense, or you can make flash cards with your vocabulary words and mark them with different symbols depending on the gender.

(Auditory) Grammar is a common topic for educational songs. Find a one intended for kids who speak your target language.

(Hands-On) Using words on sticky notes or index cards, build sentences that demonstrate grammatical concepts. If you have access to some of those little word magnets in your target language, those would probably work great for this, but if not (and I know I don’t) you can write various words, affixes, etc. on index cards or sticky notes, or use your existing flashcards if you have them.

(Logical) Create a table, chart, or diagram of a grammatical concept you’re studying.

(Collaborative) Write a post explaining a grammar topic you are learning.

(Read/Write) Read through a text, to find (and maybe highlight, circle, etc.) examples of a grammatical concept, then write more examples.

(Personal) Write about a part of your life that corresponds to the grammar topic you are studying. For example, for the future  tense, you can write about your plans or hopes.

(Creative) Write a small story relying on the grammatical concept you’re studying.

Pronunciation

(Visual) Look up diagrams of how to pronounce sounds you struggle with. These can be found as images or in an animated form in YouTube videos, and usually show what your tongue, teeth, etc. are supposed to be doing when you pronounce the sound.

(Auditory) Find a recording of a native speaker, record yourself saying the same thing, and listen for differences.

(Hands-On) Try to pronounce some tongue twisters or other pronunciation-based challenges.

(Logical) Try  learning the linguistic names of sounds you work with, and look into how they  compare to other sounds. Wikipedia has articles about the different sounds that can exist in languages and tables showing how they are used in various languages.

(Collaborative) Record yourself reading something that contains sounds you struggle with and post it for feedback, possibly on an app like HelloTalk.

(Read/Write) Look  at the written IPA pronunciations (these can be found on Wiktionary) of words you learn and look up what the symbols mean.

(Personal) Sing along to songs you like in the language, especially (for the personal category) nostalgic ones or ones meaningful to you.

(Creative) Write a tongue twister using words that are difficult for you to pronounce and practice saying it.

Cultural Context

(Visual) Explore a museum website in your target language. The museum should be located somewhere where your target language is spoken, but it up to you whether you want to look at an art museum, a science or history museum, or something else. Look at the exhibits and read the descriptions.

(Auditory) Create a playlist with traditional, classic and modern songs in various genres that either were invented in or popular in a place where your target language is spoken. Ideally using resources in your  target language, learn about the songs and genres.

(Hands-On) Using  resources in your target language, learn how to do or make something from a culture that speaks it. For example, you can look up a recipe, a tutorial for a dance style, the rules to a game, or how to make an art or craft project. (Make sure the thing you pick is being openly shared by  members of the culture it came from.)

(Logical) In your target language, learn about a scientist / inventor / etc. from somewhere the language is  spoken. Learn about their work, with explanations of what they invented or discovered, and if you want, find out other information about their life too.

(Collaborative) Comment  on or otherwise interact with the blog/YouTube channel/etc. of a native speaker,  after you read or watch it, of course. (You don’t need to receive a reply to check off this box, because that part is not under your control.)

(Read/Write) Try reading a significant work of (children’s or adult) literature in your target language.

(Personal) Learn about something relevant to your job/hobby from where your target language is spoken, using resources in the language.

(Creative) Read  about artistic or literary themes,  movements or eras where the language is spoken, and  create something (it can be something  simple) using those concepts.

[Image: The title “Language Learning Checkerboard Challenge” above a purple 8x8 table. The information contained in the table is repeated above.]

[letterboxd]

Chameleon.

For Japanuary, J-horror auteur Kiyoshi Kurosawa talks to Aaron Yap about upending genre expectations with his dreamy new travelogue To the Ends of the Earth, the unconscious connections between his films, and how it’s time for a proper evaluation of Robert Zemeckis.

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s continued, uncontested position as a horror auteur isn’t unjustified. Emerging as a key voice in the J-horror boom of the late ’90s, Kurosawa hypnotized us with his chilly, haunting, atmospheric—and often apocalyptically tinged—visions of baffling serial killers, ghosts in machines, insidious doppelgangers and vengeful apparitions.

Bong Joon-ho once called Kurosawa’s 1997 mind-bender Cure one of the greatest films ever made. Pulse, his terrifyingly prophetic 2001 film, for my money—and many Letterboxd members’—might still be the creepiest of all contemporary horrors. “It is the only film I’ve ever seen in which every single shot feels genuinely haunted,” writes Connor.

Rarely behaving in a traditional scary-movie fashion, Kurosawa’s idiosyncratic horror films often test our expectations of genre, then deliver beyond those boundaries to probe his recurring themes: identity and isolation, humanity’s relationship to technology and nature, and deep-seated anxieties that nibble away at society’s crumbling fabric. Pulse, besides being an exercise in deftly crafted dread, is a great, telling, melancholy movie about the overwhelming loneliness of the digital age.

Yoko (Atsuko Maeda) and her travel show crew in ‘To the Ends of the Earth’.

However, the general focus on his horror “side” tends to eclipse a filmography that’s far richer and more versatile than he’s usually given credit for. Over the past two decades, we’ve seen him seem forge a thrillingly chameleonic, unpredictable path that’s included an ecological thriller (Charisma), an Ozu-esque family drama (Tokyo Sonata), a metaphysical romance (Journey to the Shore) and an alien invasion sci-fi (Before We Vanish). No one is really doing it like Kurosawa, and To the Ends of the Earth is arguably his most exciting and enigmatic left-turn yet.

To the Ends of the Earth is a commissioned piece to celebrate the diplomatic relations between Japan and the Central Asian republic of Uzbekistan, but that doesn’t diminish that it’s unmistakably a Kiyoshi Kurosawa film, not a tossed-off, exoticized, postcard-pretty travelogue. His signature languorous pacing, shrewdly slippery tonal calibration, and acute spatial sensitivity are at full bore, servicing a loosely plotted tale of TV travel show host Yoko (former J-pop singer Atsuko Maeda) and her crew attempting to complete shooting an episode in the Uzbekistan capital of Tashkent.

If anything, this movie should really confirm him as a filmmaker of bold, fictive playfulness in a comparable register to Jacques Rivette, Olivier Assayas and Christian Petzold—something that 2013’s hour-long, similarly fish-out-of-water head-rush Seventh Code, also starring Maeda, hinted at. In To the Ends of the Earth, gentleness, compassion and dream-like bursts of song and fantasy percolate through a disquieting maze of displacement—cultural, artistic, gendered—and the result is an adventurous, unpindownable, thoroughly humanistic work of curiosity and imagination.

Some years ago you did a “double feature”-themed interview with the Belfort Entrevues Film Festival where you revealed the sources of inspiration for some of your films. What film, if any, was a chief influence for To the Ends of the Earth, and can you tell us in what way? Kiyoshi Kurosawa: When I make my work, I often consciously refer to films from the past, but that’s usually the case with genre films. For example, Cure was greatly inspired by The Silence of the Lambs. However, To the Ends of the Earth is not a genre movie, so I wasn’t consciously thinking of any specific films. However, the composition of the story, that the main character appears in every scene, is based on films by the Dardenne brothers. Viewing their films The Child and Two Days, One Night, it’s clear to see how the depiction of just one person can turn trivial incidents into something serious and suspenseful.

Atsuko Maeda and Kiyoshi Kurosawa on the set of ‘To the Ends of the Earth’.

Watching Bright Future, To the Ends of the Earth and Creepy back-to-back recently, I noticed several parallels and motifs which may or may not be intentional. For example, a jellyfish makes an appearance in a scene on TV in Creepy, or there’s a TV report of a blaze in To the Ends of the Earth that momentarily hints at a bigger natural catastrophe that echoes the jellyfish swarm in Bright Future, or other apocalyptic moments in your films like Charisma and Before We Vanish. Do you find that some of these motifs work on a subconscious level for you, or were some of them intentionally threaded in? It’s a very interesting point. Some of them were intentional and some were not at all. It’s true about jellyfish, they appear in both Bright Future and Creepy. However, this is the first time I’ve noticed. The endings of Charisma and Before We Vanish were already written in the script by necessity, so of course, it’s intentional. The depiction of the blaze on TV in To the Ends of the Earth was introduced to show something happening in Japan while the main character is taking a small adventure in Uzbekistan. I wanted to show that her boyfriend was in some kind of crisis there. While the fire on the TV is merely an accident, it does appear apocalyptic. I may have overdone that a bit. Perhaps some kind of unconscious thinking was at work.

That amusement park ride scene in To the Ends of the Earth has stayed with me in the way it suggests terror out of something seemingly mundane. What are some scenes from other films that have stayed with you? The amusement park ride scene wasn’t introduced to express terror. What I wanted to show was how crazy the assignment is and Yuko’s professionalism. She takes on the assignment without fear. This may have been a bit overdone as well. However, I thought that Atsuko Maeda, who didn’t hesitate to actually ride it three times, was a real professional. Apart from that, if I think about the movies that force people to experience horror, what comes to me are Roger Corman’s Pit and the Pendulum. Tobe Hooper’s The Funhouse, George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road. I also remembered the episode in Freddie Francis’s Torture Garden, where a grand piano has a will to kill people, which was great.

Your films tend to be very location-based; environments and spaces appear to play a significant part. The pandemic has been the ultimate test of our relationship with spaces and each other. How has the pandemic impacted you as a filmmaker, and are there themes and ideas that you are interested in exploring further as a result of Covid? As you pointed out, when I make a movie, I pay great attention to the location. The moment I find a good location, I feel that the script will be transformed into a movie. It is the moment when fiction and reality are fused. It’s hard to say anything though, I haven’t made a movie since the pandemic started. What I can say, at least, is that sitting in front of the computer at home is not cinematic at all. So far, I don’t feel that something new will be born from it. What should I do? After all, I feel that a movie can only be made by going out in the city with a camera after utilizing the best epidemic prevention system possible.

If you had to pick a film that’s a personal favorite, which would you pick, and why? It's too difficult a question. Japanese movies and foreign movies have different viewpoints. Also, there are completely different categories of movies [that] greatly influence me when I make films and the movies I saw when I was young that make me nostalgic. It’s impossible to choose just one. But, well, the one that comes to mind is Sam Peckinpah’s The Ballad of Cable Hogue, which is both nostalgic and heavily influential for me.

You’ve spoken about your fondness for American filmmakers like Tobe Hooper, Robert Aldrich, Steven Spielberg et al. Are there new, or more recent American filmmakers and films that have caught your attention or that you’re particularly excited by? I don’t know much about young American directors, but what I always care about is Alfonso Cuarón. Of course he is not a new, young filmmaker, but an auteur. Also, since this is a good opportunity, I’d like to mention Robert Zemeckis. He made such masterpieces as Cast Away and What Lies Beneath around 2000. For some reason, he has never been properly evaluated at all. For a time he was devoted to animation. However, he made a spectacular return to live-action films with Flight and continues to shoot unique masterpieces like Allied and Welcome to Marwen. Of course, not many people appreciate these works. However, he does not seem to care about public opinion at all and continues to boldly shoot new works. Perhaps Zemeckis is the American film director who makes the most authentic films today.

What are your movie-watching habits like? Do you continue to watch movies on physical media or prefer streaming these days? What was the last movie you saw in a theater? Basically, I like to watch movies at an ordinary movie theater in the city the most. When I can’t go to the movie theater, or even though I know the film is going to be boring but I have to watch a movie for business, I have no choice but to watch it on DVD or Blu-ray. Of course, I also use VOD once in a while. The last movie I saw in the theater, as of today, was the Japanese film The Voice in the Crime. I saw that just yesterday. I saw it with my wife at a cinema complex in Shinjuku, Tokyo. It was the latest work by the director who made the previous masterpiece Flying Colors, and I expected much from it. It was speedy and quite well done until the middle of the film, but by the ending, it was too boring. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a good movie.

What’s a memorable film-related moment from your childhood, perhaps something you experienced with family or friends, or a film that scared you or made you cry? The movies that my generation often watched growing up were mainly monster movies. The most unforgettable one was Matango. Like Godzilla and Mothra, it was directed by Ishirō Honda. I went to see this movie with my friends. It had a rather cute touch in the promotional materials depicting a mushroom with a monstrous appearance. However, the content was completely different from a normal monster movie. Shipwrecked survivors on an uninhabited island encounter monstrous mushroom creatures washed up on the shore. These are not unknown creatures such as Godzilla or Mothra, but the horrifying ending of a human being. The characters are being infected, changing one another into mushroom humans. All of us children trembled from the bottom of our hearts. In retrospect, the work is an extreme horror aiming along the same line as [Howard Hawks and] Christian Nyby’s The Thing from Another World. It was probably the first time I encountered horror which was not “to escape from destruction” but “when a human being becomes something not human”.

Is there a filmmaker or film you think about a lot that you don’t get to talk about much and would like to show some appreciation? I haven’t talked much about the Battles Without Honor and Humanity series directed by Kinji Fukasaku. I don’t know how well this series of Japanese movies is known abroad, but when I was a high-school student I saw this and quickly became a big fan. I’ve watched a variety of yakuza movies since then, and it’s safe to say that nothing beats this series. As the title suggests, the films depict a yakuza world without “Jingi” (yakuza’s moral code), and it was really humorous and exciting to see the betrayals and the destruction. After I saw this, all those traditional yakuza movies dominated by the strange ideology of “Jingi” looked like a childish fantasy.

Related content

The Japanuary Challenge 2021

Explore more J-horror, ’80s J-horror and ’90s J-horror

Follow Aaron on Letterboxd

‘To the Ends of the Earth’ is available for rental in the US via distributor KimStim. From February 5-25, Japan Society’s virtual cinema hosts ‘21st Century Japan: Films from 2001-2020’, featuring films from Hirokazu Kore-eda, Naomi Kawase and Takashi Miike, the online US premieres of Sion Sono’s ‘Red Post on Escher Street’ and Yukiko Mishima’s ‘Shape of Red’, plus a special focus on Kiyoshi Kurosawa (‘Bright Future’, ‘Journey to the Shore’, ‘Real’).

[devil-kindred]

Get to Know Me - raisinghellinotherworlds

Saw @pd3 do this and though I’d give it a go!

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1. Name : Siren (it’s a pseudonym!)

2. Nationality: American

3. Age: 27

4. Birthday: January 29th

5. Zodiac sign (or your primal zodiac sign): Aquarius

6. Gender: Female

7. Sexuality: Heterosexual

More below the cut

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8. Your looks (add a picture or describe yourself)

For the record this is the only recent picture of myself I like and this is about as much of my face as you’ll ever see bc I know my angles.

9. What do you/did you study?: I went to school for a Bachelors in Arts with and emphasis on Sciences but never finished it bc 1) college is expensive and 2) I don’t know what I want to do career-wise so there’s not a point in going back anymore.

10. What’s your current job like?/What job would you like to have?: I’m a service desk associate at a department store. Something where I could deal with less people bc boy does this job push my patience sometimes.

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11. What is your birth order?: Firstborn/Oldest.

12. How many siblings do you have?: Technically four, but only two living.

13. Do you have good relations with your family?: My immediate family. My siblings are closer to each other (but they’re only two years apart) but we get along. I also have a good relationship with my parents though I’m not as close to my mom as I could be it’s hard to forget the not nice things your parent say to you as a kid.

14. How many friends do you have?: Lots though only a few I see/talk to on a regular basis.

15. Your relationship status: Single.

16. What do you look for in a SO?: Intelligent, kind, has a sense of humor.

17. Do you have a crush?: I guess.

18. When was your first kiss?: WHY *sighs* I was... 25.

19. Do you prefer serious and meaningful relationships or casual dating/one night stands?: I’ve... never been in an actual relationship? I’d like to say serious.

20. What are your deal breakers? Being rude, cheating, and treating me like a child/you know what’s best for me/someone in need of saving (new flash, i am not your princess peach/some damsel in distress. If you need to rescue someone I am not your girl).

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21. How was your day?: It’s still early into the day and I go to work in about an hour and a half and I get to close so we’ll see!

22. Favourite food & drink: French Fries. Or anything with potatoes. I’m a fiend. And Dr. Pepper or Coffee.

23. What position do you sleep in?: On my side/stomach on the part of the bed that’s against the wall.

24. What was your last dream about?: It was... highly NSFT and no, I will not go into detail.

25. Your fears: I’m not a fan of spiders or bugs of any kind really, I hate clowns, and I don’t like thunderstorms. Or tornados.

26. Your dreams: Move, either out of state or out of the country.

27. Your goals: See above.

28. Any pets?: A bird, Momo.

29. What are your hobbies?: Writing, playing video games, and reading (fanfic or books)

30. Any cool places in your area?: I’m sure there are but I live in a town surrounded by corn and other farmland so... it’s anyone’s best guess.

31. What was your last awkward situation?: The other day when a customer stared at me for a solid three minutes when I explained that due to the pandemic we’re no longer offering one of our services in an effort to reduce contact.

32. What is your last regret?: That I didn’t realize the true nature of some people who I no longer speak to sooner.

33. Language/s you can speak: English, Spanish (I’m so rusty though), a little bit of French, and a teeny tiny bit of Japanese.

34. Do you believe in astrological stuff? (Zodiac, tarot, etc.): I believe in my many things so yes.

35. Have any quirks?: Uh... I mess with my hair when I’m nervous? & the more nervous I get my (already high) voice gets higher and will go up several octaves the more nervous I get?

36. Your pet peeves: People in my apartment building slamming the front door all the damn time.

37. Ideal vacation: Somewhere with nice scenery and where it’s calm.

38. Any scars?: Quite a few small ones on my head from a car accident when I was just a baby (I went through a window- got a few scrapes but other than that was unharmed) and one on my hand (it’s on both sides of my hand too) from when I was toddler and got bit by a dog.

39. What does your last text message say?: “I’ll let you know when I get some gameplay posted!” I have a sideblog for casual TS4 gameplay. Was telling a friend that I was going to post new stuff soon.

40. Last 5 things from your search history: No thanks! It’s all just checking if a word is really a word and spelling anyways.

41. What’s your [Device] background?: Lockscreen is a wallpaper from FFXV ft. The Chocobros; Hope Screen is Sam & Evie.

42. What do you daydream about?: Writing mostly.

43. Describe your dream home: Decent amount of space, a library room to hold all my books... good lighting, comfy.... preferably NOT in the middle of nowhere.

44. What’s your religion/Your thought about religion: I am not a fan. Particularly of Christianity but everyone has their own beliefs and in that regard, to each their own. Just don’t try to convert me bc the answer is f*ck no.

45. Your personality type: INFP.

46. The most dangerous thing you’ve done?: Climbed onto the roof of the shed when I was little because I got something stuck up there.

47. Are you happy with your current life?: For the most part!

48. Some things you’ve tried in your life: Gymnastics, Ballet, etc.

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49. What does your wardrobe consist of?: Lots of t-shirts, jeans, shorts, flats, boots, etc.

50. Favourite colour to wear?: Black or Blue.

51. How would you describe your style?: Extremely casual.

52. Are you happy with your current looks?: Kinda? I really need to cut my hair because it’s gotten so long it’s annoying. But I can put up with it until it’s safe again bc pandemic. My hair is not that important I assure you.

53. If you could change/add something to your appearance - impossible or not - what would it be?: Oh God, could I be taller? Like at least 5’3”? Which is still teeny but better than my 4’9” ass.

Do you have any piercings or tattoos?: I have 3 piercings and three tattoos (two finished, one in progress)

55. Do you get complimented often?: Maybe? I’m oblivious to the point that you could have a flashing neon sign with the compliment written on it and it would probably still go over my head.

56. Favourite aesthetic?: Biker Chic!

57. A popular trend that you dislike: Neon.

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58. Songs you’re currently obsessed with?: Blessed Be - Spiritbox.

59. Song you normally wouldn’t admit you like: If I like a song, I like it. But if I have to pick one, I know everyone hates Despacitio. I know, ok but I really like the original version bc I like the sound. Latin music always has a fun groove to it.

60. Favourite genre?: Rock & Metal.

61. Favourite artist/band/genre?: Type O Negative, Pallbearer, Ice Nine Kills. Give me all the goth rock/metal and just fun metal in general.

62. Hated popular songs/artists?: Oh boy... don’t hate me but I um... don’t care too much for T Swift? And I’m not a fan of country.

63. Put your music on shuffle and list first 5: Devil’s // Door - VCTMS, Karasu - The GazettE, Path - Apocalyptica, I Walk the Line - Halsey, Drumming Song - Florence + the Machine

64. Can you sing or play any instruments?: I can kinda play bass but I’m still learning so it’s just like... the very bare basics.

65. Do you like karaoke?: I’m very self-conscious so no.

66. Own any albums?: Yes, though majority are digital.

67. Do you listen to radio? What stations?: Yes. I have it on for background noise in my room in which case I don’t pay attention to it, but I have XM radio in my car where I listen to Octane/Liquid Metal/Turbo.

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68. Favourite movie/series?: The Dark Knight trilogy or Hellraiser or Nightbreed.

69. Favourite genre of movies/books/etc: Horror, Sci-fi, and fantasy.

70. Your fictional crush/es: Too many. Look at my OCs and their SO’s and you’ll find a bunch of them.

71. Which fictional character is you?: My friends would say Mira Jane from Fairy Tail. My bestie says Mercedes from Fire Emblem Three Houses (minus the devout part bc... I do not have nice feelings re-religion. You do you though!).

72. Are you a shipper? List your otps, if so: Yes, and once again you’ll be reading for eternity. So I’ll sum it up as too many to list.

73. Favourite greek god?: Apollo.

74. A legend from where you live that you like: It’s said that before big disasters happen in the town I live in + the surrounding areas, that you’ll see a panther. Supposedly one has been seen before at least 4 different bad things that have happened over the years. I’m in the midwest though so take that as you will.

75. Do you like art?: I do but I don’t really have a favorite. ... I am kinda partial to Van Gogh though.

76. Can you share your other social media?: I have a Pinterest but since my other social media has my name (which I also share with an OC whoops. That’s what I get for being indecisive and going the first name the name generator gave me) I’d rather not. If you ask and we’re friends I’ll probably give it to you but...

77. Favourite youtubers?: I don’t really watch too many anymore but I’ve been watching a lot of jacksepticeye’s gameplay. Aside that I tend to just watch channels like PlayStation Access or Outsidexbox.

78. Favourite platform?: Instagram

79. How much time do you spend on the internet?: More than I should, I’m sure.

80. What video games have you played? Which one’s your favourite? Uh, if I had to list them all you’d literally be reading this for eternity. To sum it up, I mostly play RPGs/JRPGs, open-world, survival horror (my fave), and a few (emphasis on few) FPS. Favorites are (once again with a limit): Bioshock, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Until Dawn, Silent Hill 2, and Fatal Frame.

81. Your favourite books (manga also counts): do you know how f*cking hard this question is as someone who’s a bookworm? Ok, ok um... Gotta have a limit or I’ll never shut up... um... Three favorites: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, Horns by Joe Hill, and American Gods by Neil Gaiman.

82. Do you play board/card games?: On occasion! They’re best with bigger groups but alas, my apartment is rather small and I don’t have a lot of space for multiple people so I don’t play them often.

83. Have you ever been to a night marathon in cinema? No, but it sounds fun.

84. Favourite holiday: Halloween!

85. Are you into dramas?: As in, tv dramas? Kinda? I have a friend on lived in SK for a time and got into K-dramas so I watch them with her from time-to-time when she visits.

Would you use a Death Note if you had one?: No.

87. What changes would you make in the world, no matter how impossible, if you had the power to?: Oh boy... make everyone get along, ensure everyone could live their life to the best possible, etc.

88. Could you survive a zombie apocalypse?: Possibly.

89. If you had to be turned into a paranormal being, what would it be?: I’m going with mythical instead of strictly paranormal but... a vampire!

90. What would you want to happen to you after your death?: As in to my body? Cremate me. To my stuff, give my books to a good home and take care of my bird.

91. If you had to change your name, what would be your pick?: Most people call me by my middle name already since I got tired of people calling me the wrong name (& I like my middle name better) and insisting my first name was actually a nickname (it’s not, it’s the same as the musician I’m named after) so if I were to eventually be bothered enough, I’d have it legally changed to my middle name.

92. Who would you switch your life with for a week?: I don’t know to be honest. I’m fairly happy with my life so I think I’d just not switch.

93. Pick an emoji to be your tattoo: 🌊

94. Write 3 things about yourself - only one of them must be true: I took karate classes for several years, I’ve never dyed my hair, I’ve had two jobs thus far.

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95. Cold or hot?: Cold I guess? If we’re talking in reference to seasons give me cool (aka Fall).

96. Be a hero or be a villain?: Hero because being a villain would mean I’d have to be mean to people and I can’t even pick the mean options in video games without feeling guilty so...

97. Sing everything you want to say or rhyme?: um... no? I’m not quite certain what this means but I’m going to go with no?

98. Shapeshifting or controlling time?: Shapeshifting!

99. Be immortal or be immune to everything aside from natural death?: Immortal.