#the vibe here is all over the place

[vajazzly]

thank u for the tag @withtheoldstars !!!

top 7 spotify songs on repeat!

no pressure tagging @crushofdoves @kaaaaaaarf <333

[chiaki-c]

i have now watched this movie Twice

[chirpsythismorning]

S5 opener REAL

[rattkachuk]

Hello! Hope you are having a good day.

So I have a question for you, just ignore when you don't feel like answering.

I came to Mattdrai via the enemies/rivals to lovers tag and then got sucked into hockey. I really like the fanon take on Leon, fav character, fanon Matthew was fine but way too woobified and infantilized in so many fics. So my surprise when I started to watch games, interviews etc. Public Matthew is so confident, so loving, awesome family to back him up, especially Brady, hot as hell, sexy way of playing hockey, amazing public persona. Loved and respected by his team, beyond hockey.

Then Leon. His only trait seems to be that he's pissy which I can appreciate but it seems that he's just a downright mean, arrogant guy with a superiority complex (see that interview when he puts Silovs down.) I don't find him stoic at all but he's just seems boring and bland and yeah, pissy. It doesn't seem like he has fun or likes his team a lot or is liked by them (Connor aside and his skills aside.) His friendship with Connor seems the only endearing or likeable thing. He even looks good in a bland way and his hockey is while it's so skillful it's not hot and also I wonder why his dirty plays aren't called out more often.

So what do I miss? Where does great fanon Leon come from? Why is he written mostly so superior to Matthew and where comes the "his team likes Leon so much but Matthew is an outcast in his own team come from?) It's so far from what I gather from old and new interviews or games and I have watched a lot, also German interviews. I really would like to like Leon, shipping them had been more fun when I didn't find his public self so jarring. What do I not see what everyone else seems to get?

Sorry for the long ask! Have a great day and thank you

first off thank you for such a thought out ask! i don't get to dive into things like this a lot outside of writing fic and it got my brain gears going.

to get right into the bulk of this ask: i get what you are saying about leon. that can be the way he comes off for sure, and look everything i'm gonna say? i'm talking out of my ass here. i don't claim to know anything about him as a person besides what's publicly presented, and i don't have much right to theorize about why he is the way that he is, but i'd be lying if i said i didn't think about it. how would i write rpf otherwise, right 💀

i think he cares a lot. and i think sometimes he gets so wrapped up in things, how things should be, how he should be performing, etc, and when it doesn't go a certain way he gets frustrated and snarky (eg, pissy comments and such). but i don't see that being bad necessarily, especially when it's seems to come from such a team oriented state of mind. which, i dont think he dislikes his team at all? i think if anything, he has a sort of blind faith in his team, and that's the only context i could see a 'superiority complex' making sense in. and yah maybe a little misplaced at times, but ultimately i think it comes from believing so fully in his team and not seeing that come to fruition. he really does not seem to care about his individual performance much at all, so how self obsessed can he be? when i think about leon i just see someone that is ultimately very passionate and committed to the game he plays. i'm also curious to know where you get the vibe that his team doesn't like him? simply because i never got that impression from any of the other oilers, they all seem like they're obsessed with him.

beyond hockey, i see a caring, sweet, kindhearted individual. anytime i see a picture or vid of him interacting with bowie, or even the things his girlfriend posts about him, the comments he leaves for people on ig, and yah of course in the way he talks/acts around connor, i see fragments of someone soooo different than the little two minute post game interviews (which, can we judge any hockey player on those? i think they all hate them dfkjgsd). it's not always something i actively go digging for or have examples of the top of my head, but i do see it, and it definitely goes into creating the version of leon that i have in my mind.

hey, and, he's a silly guy!!! please, i know the reputation is pissy and humourless, ESPECIALLY in fic, but that man is so funny. so many random offhanded comments that make me pause and then laugh. a different sense of humour but it's so there. i love the sandcastle vid from the asg last year and feel like it's a good example of that, all sunburnt and happy. also hey, big man in tune with his fear of the ocean? love that. that little vid of him dancing on the ice earlier this season, those halloween photos where he's dressed as a monkey, every time he talks to a kid. hell, seeing him in warmups and watching the way he takes time to interact fans?? loveee watching warmups but i'd never had a player actually acknowledge my existence before leon!

also i really enjoy his personality on the ice, i like the rat behaviour and the sassy comments that he makes to other players/refs, i like the bitch moves, and i like his hockey too. i think his game is dependable and like you said skillful, and while maybe not the most creative, the sureness and the technical aspect it is hot to me. so my thoughts on everything are probably skewed in that regard.

anyways this was just a whole lot of rambling about why i find him interesting, endearing even, but i understand the perception you have. i don't like some players that other people love, just cause i cant see what they see. and honestly that's sometimes just the way it is! if you don't like leon, maybe u just don't like him and thats fine.

disclaimer that i have only been on hockeyblr for a couple years, and really didn't spare many thoughts for leon til the beginning of the 22/23 season. truthfully i'm hardly the person to ask about leon imo, but of course i have thoughts anyways! if someone else with more knowledge reads my bit of rambling here, please feel free to chime in and add your voice to this!

and side note, ofc, i have to touch on this bc who would i be if i'm not one to talk about matthew; in the way of m.tkachuk, i think that in the early days of mattdrai it was maybe a fair take away during his time with the flames (minus the woobifying). even though he was loved so much here and had some fucking times, and i think the team was mostly good to him (player wise if not regarding management, that is), i see such a stark difference now that he's on the panthers. he seems much happier and more confident, and obviously he's clicking with the cats on another level, and i do see a shift in how he's been portrayed in fics since tbh.

[kindahoping4forever]

Calum @ The 5SOS Show Tour Lisbon - 23 September 2023

[empty-blog-for-lurking]

So i finally listened to The Magnus Protocol and uhh holy shit, yall mind if i

[The contents of this post has been deleted]

[luminarai]

I love love love following artists who are in fandoms that I’m not only not in but that I also know nothing about!! I don’t know the characters or the ships or the discourse or anything really I’m just here for the pretty lines and colours babey!! And I don’t want to know either I want to be totally ignorant and just vibe because the art is amazing and I love it!!!! Thank you artists everywhere mwah

[hyperdrama]

terrible playlists no one asked for!

this year has been big for me in terms of djing and how it is very much about the curation of a space, what towns prefer as opposed to cities, which countries are more open to niche preferences than others.

i also started making mixed CDs for my friends again, it's something i stopped doing in 2019 when i caved and started using spotify (and here i am now, intending to move away from the platform lol). it's really nice to make gifts for your friends, esp when you are constantly away from your home city/country.

anyway here's some of my # faves i've slapped together from my rekordbox sets/things i've burned onto CDs for friends, on spotify for convenience

"work from home" people at 10am on a tuesday - what the title says i guess. still refining this one but it’s fun to dance to. lots of scandinavian star production. the bird is one of my fav musical discoveries this yr, if ur ever in copenhagen, come see him. was not prepared for his incredible live energy + tht basshunter tattoo (lol!)

forgive me father for i have synthed - featuring some lust for youth, purient, mbv, yves tumor. those kind of vibes.

the sunday sessions volumes - every sunday evening, my best friend and i program music for an hour or two. vibe depends on the day. vol 1 is quite moody but chill i.e king woman, slowdive, chelsea wolfe

pissing me the fuck off all by yourself handsome? - mostly hardcore/punk stuff, a lot of aus 80s/90s bands and onwards

snapping on the latex - funky! thanks fox mulder for the title inspiration.

testicular torsion - uh, my personal go to 'just fuck me up' mix. 16+ hours of unorganised mess from my physical metal collection. idea is you find what you like in here and go from there. it's very broad. also yeah, this is a part two. don’t ask where part one disappeared to.

demazin heartache - some fuzzy noisy dreamy shoegaze to alleviate your springtime break up season n hayfever woes. not sponsored by demazin sadly. made for everyone that went through a brutal spring breakup recently (something was in the water for sure) <3

[kennyomegasweave]

The front desk gym receptionist looking at Keen with disdain and then again with the disdain after Captain sucked his dick in the locker room. Looking all like "stop fucking in my gym nasty bitches." But he only knows that cause he's paying for Captain's clips. Seems like everyone was at the devil's sacrament.

[impossible-rat-babies]

obssessed with the suite eyrie has in radz-at/han that I’m building in my mind

[mistoffeleesisawitch]

Anyways I think Alicent was high in episode 9. Girlie was all over the place. Swear she spent half that episode on a whole other plane of existence to everyone else. That’s my fan theory. Alicent does Westerosi drugs

[voulezloux]

i’m tired of having to explain to my friends why i had to make a post basically begging for support while im unable to work because it only makes me more angry every time i do so. like i can’t get short term disability because that’s not a benefit that they offer and even if they did, i would have to pay for that myself in order to get it. i could’ve rolled over my old plan from the previous owner to the new owner and pay for it separately. but the one time i had used it, they put me under illness and not injury (which is what it was. because i injured my foot and couldn’t stand to do my job. i even put it as an injury and they said i lied and changed it) and the payout i got barely covered my bills. i didn’t see a point in continuing to pay for a service that would do that plus it took a full month after i went back to work to even get the payout. the only benefits they offer at 401(k) with them matching, PTO, and health insurance. that’s it. i’m using what’s left of my PTO this week to bulk up my paycheck so i can actually get some kind of money but after that i don’t know when i’ll have a paycheck next. i’m looking for work because i can’t afford not to work. there’s nothing in place to protect the worker at my job in the event of this happening. the only reason im not completely losing my mind is because im still able to get health insurance while im unable to work but that’s not because of them. that’s because of FMLA. if that wasn’t in place, who the fuck knows man

[esteemed-excellency]

@eddie-dearest I had to add your tags because that's exactly what I asked myself when I started thinking about the character. I didn't plan a backstory or characterisation, I started playing because the alternative history concept of the game seemed intriguing and I wanted to explore what it had to offer in terms of writing. I played a lot of storylines just to see how the plot would proceed and I was immediately hooked by the mystery (this was around 2013). Hiram's characterisation is mainly based on the choices I made in game, and he turned out to be quite a mess, but in a fun chaotic way.

The rest of the post is under the cut because it got a little long.

After some years I started thinking about what kind of character would have made those choices and I elaborated a first concept for an oc, but I never thought that much about it. Around 2017 I deleted my old mail, completely forgetting it was linked to my game account so I had to start everything again, which was kind of a relief given all the new game dynamics that were added to the early game, and this time I had the character ready. I got some of my friends into the game too and we made a group chat (The Paramount Polycule started as the chat name lol) and that was the starting point for headcanons and characterisation development.

I love history and the 19th century is particularly interesting to me in terms of societal changes, a hyphen between the ancient regime and the contemporary 20th century ideologies (with all the good and bad implications that this entails), and technological advances. The process of change and how people react and adapt to it is what really intrigues me, and it's what got me into the game in the first place, and what prompted the background for the character. Hiram is fascinated by change and he loves to keep up with the times, I don't think he ever felt left behind by history. If he feels there's something he can't understand he dives head first into it until he figures it out. He approaches challenges like puzzles or games and he's still capable of wonder, even after a good dose of corruption arc.

Speaking of corruption arcs, I'm a tragedy enjoyer, other than a chaotic shenanigans appreciator, and I like when the narrative borders on horror. Gothic fiction with its specific motifs is one of my favourite genres, and another reason I started playing the game. I especially appreciate the theme of a place being haunted by itself and its history and/or moving through history haunted by what it was/what it is/what it could be, so you can see why Fallen London is so compelling to me. I also like themes of faustian bargains and that's why my character is Like That.

In terms of general vibes and aesthetic I love late 19th and early 20th century fashion, and I wanted Hiram to have the look of some actor from the 20s/30s interpreting a late 19th century character as an excuse to mix up multiple decades of fashion. The devils are anachronistic and fashion in Fallen London is so interesting to speculate. Pre code Hollywood and and pre nazi european cinema have the perfect aesthetic for me, and I got particularly inspired by the drama of austrian operetta films, hence the Anton Walbrook and Ronal Colman faceclaims. On a more personal note, I just projected some gender as I always do when I design a character. I like earlier 19th century fashion too, and that's why I made him so dandyish.

To end the post, here's a non-comprehensive list of medias that inspired Hiram's vibes and aesthetic:

the general concept of penny dreadfuls

À Rebours by Joris-Karl Huysmans: not the protagonist, but the circling pointlessness of the plot, the aesthetic of the house, and the spiralling

whatever happens when you mix the late wave of english Romanticism with the Decadent movement

Doctor Faustus by Thomas Marlowe: that's like, thee bluebrint, and Hiram appreciates the irony

Tales from the Vienna Woods by Johann Strauss II

Delirium Waltz by Josef Strauss

Enemies to Lovers by Joshua Kyan Aalampour

Mr. Malum by The Dear Hunter: mandatory dramatic song, this is Hiram's playlist if anyone wants more music

Maskerade (1933): main faceclaim movie, the promo pics with Paula Wessely and Anton Walbrook dancing are inspo for the Quiet Deviless and Hiram (plot is extremely melodramatic if anyone is interested)

Gaslight (1940) and The Red Shoes (1948): Anton Walbrook goes insane with expressions

The Devil to Pay (1930): Ronald Colman is the other faceclaim actor, he has a funny dog in this movies, inspo for Sugarplum

The man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo (1935): just the general fancy vibes, a suitcase full of money, and the iconic moustache look

[mushtoons]

i understand where that last reblog is coming from but honestly i think saying "white people you are 1,000% the origin of the problem" is a little. extreme. feel free to explain where that sentiment is coming from /nf /gen

not about to get into a racism argument ( like ik u probably didn't mean it like that but just saying as a heads up )

but dude white people ARE the origin, you think poc just choose to glorify the idea of being white blonde and blue eyed? nah man that stems from white folk down to the very core of it, so we are 1000% of the problem subconsciously or not, it sucks yeah but thats why we need to work harder to fix stupid stereotypes like that for future generations

[cutiecorner]

Woof grrrr

[spotsupstuff]

ur grading people and if they get an f theyre blocked? my main you aint a kindergarten teacher this is a microblogging platform

yeah, that's why there's that function called blocking! :) cuz this is a microblogging site! that's what microblogging platforms have! :) so you don't have to put up with people's shit! :) interesting that kindergarten teachers where you live are capable of blocking people in real life, hope you had fun with that