#used to think it was a tumblr made up thing like goncharov

[fandom]

Top 23 of 2023

Have you been aching to get your hot little hands on 52 weeks of data around original posts, likes, reblogs, and searches, all weighted and ranked and tied up into categories with a nice little bow on top? Well, today’s your day! It should come as no surprise that Artists on Tumblr reign supreme: from stunning traditional art, jaw-dropping digital art, fanart, sculptures, textile art—you name it, basically—this year’s list shows that Tumblr truly is the home for art and artists. Thank you, Artists on Tumblr, for enriching our dashboards day after day. 

Rounding out the top three, we have two iconic shows: Good Omens is live-action, and The Owl House is animated, but both have a heck of a love story at their core. The second season of Good Omens blessed us with not one but two ineffably exquisite ships, while the final season of The Owl House broke and then healed fans’ hearts in equal measure. Thanks, @danaterrace! Actually, come to think of it, the Good Omens finale kinda did the same in reverse. Thanks to you, too, @neil-gaiman! We can’t wait for season 3. 

Speaking of heartbreak and healing, Our Flag Means Death’s second season offered both in droves. The entire cast gave stellar performances, and fans couldn’t have been happier to see the kinds of representation the show displayed. Last year’s #1 topic, Stranger Things, may have dropped a bit, but trust us, you wouldn’t know it from the amount of meta, fanart, and fics in the tag. And did you hear about the live-action adaptations of both The Last of Us and One Piece? They were a preeeetty big deal this year, too. Check ‘em out if you haven’t yet (lol, of course you have). And we’d be remiss not to mention the hugely dedicated fans, fanartists, and fic writers devoting their time to all things Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Y’all deserve a little pizza, as a treat.

2023 was also a year for blockbuster movies, which of course hasn’t escaped anybody’s notice here on Tumblr. Barbie smashed box offices worldwide and left us reeling with every re-watch. How can one describe Greta Gerwig’s pink-filled opus? It certainly is one of the movies of all time. Meanwhile, with its incredible animation and soundtrack, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse introduced us to a whole new multiverse of Spider-People, opening the portal to a veritable flood of incredible OCs. And then, of course, we got a fresh perspective on an old classic when cinephiles introduced Martin Scorscese’s cinematic masterpiece, Goncharov (1973), to a new generation of film aficionados who resoundingly agree that it is, in fact, the greatest mafia movie ever made. We’re so glad this underrated film finally got the acclaim it has long deserved.

In the realms of gaming and tech, the long-anticipated Baldur’s Gate 3 has basically become everyone’s new favorite D&D/dating sim combination. Of course, the Pokémon franchise, games, shows, and Hatsune Miku collabs remain perennial favorites. Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, sorry, we mean of course X, made waves across the internet. Similarly, the Reddit blackout drove Redditors to new venues, and Tumblr users welcomed the folks from r/196 with open arms—we’re huge fans of your memes, y’all, and you fit right in. Welcome, we’re glad you enjoy the chaos. Here’s a fun fact: if we included post metadata in Year in Review rankings, #polls, introduced in January of 2023, would have been the #5 topic on Tumblr this year. Phenomenal. 

And, oh right. Taylor Swift had kind of a big year, what with the albums, the epic global tour, and the movie and stuff. Fantastic work, @taylorswift, the Swifties on Tumblr thank you for everything.

This is Tumblr’s Year in Review.

Artists on Tumblr

Good Omens

The Owl House

Barbie

Pokémon

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

Critical Role

Goncharov

Taylor Swift

Genshin Impact

Stranger Things

The Last of Us

Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Elon Musk

196

Star Wars

Our Flag Means Death

Crowley | Good Omens

LGBTQ

Cottagecore

Baldur's Gate 3

One Piece

Aziraphale | Good Omens

[classic-maya]

The whole goncharov thing reminds me of when the Sherlock (BBC) fandom collectively fancast Michael Fassbender as Sebastian Moran and then we just moved on from there. Like mormor was my primary ship, and one half the ship did not even exist in the show. We made gifsets, copious fics, fanvids, I was obsessed with a cosplaying rpf couple who dressed up as our modern day interpretation of Moran with BBC Moriarty and they were many more than them. Anyway, what I am saying is that it’s not that surprising we can use that hive brain to mass hallucinate an entire film, if it wasn’t as a joke it could even become someone’s primary fandom for a while here on tumblr dot com and I think that’s beautiful

[linisiane]

I’m kind of annoyed at the big posts about Zepotha rn. You guys are gatekeepers and don’t even understand what you’re gatekeeping! Cohesion this and lack of plot that. “Skill issue” “Copycat!—” NO. We must go deeper.

Goncharov was a love letter to tumblr fandom culture. An analysis of the way we collectively talk queer themes into existence.

Tumblr blogs dedicated to queer ships. Intricate metas on the queer themes of a work. Screenshot redraws of romantic moments. Comics that are incredibly horny but still somehow capture the original themes. Prompt fills of what we imagine the story could’ve been had there been another (gayer) way.

So many of these types of posts on tumblr are considered reaches or “making things up” by the greater world. But they are analyses made meaningful through this shared sense of community, this shared experience of queerness in a society that doesn’t think of us or our themes as real. Goncharov being “made up” is a celebration of the way we come together to make the queer themes we want to see in the world, especially the ones the world doesn’t think exists. A way to say, “Of course we’re ‘mAkiNg tHiNgS uP,’ Goncharov is made up,” like it’s some sort of metaphor made literal.

Yes, the Google docs and the Martin Scorsese movie framework are a huge part of what made Goncharov work, but what spread excitement are the Goncharov posts just like the ones I listed above. Goncharov isn’t just what we imagine this fake movie to be, but also the fandom/queer culture we imagined surrounded it, and I’d argue that this culture is just as much of a framework for Goncharov as the Martin Scorsese thing was. Why else have non-canonical gay ships in the movie we made up?

TikTok’s problem is that it doesn’t have the original passion and love for queer analysis to gel it the way Goncharov did. Or really anything to gel it beyond cheap clout chasing. No depth, only virality.

It’s like a cute in joke being turned into loveless corporate marketing. Taking something from its original context to prey upon it, ruining what was good about it in the first place. It feels like when corporations tried to recreate Barbenheimer, except it’s someone trying to create a trend on TikTok to market their song, only for the trend to burn out quickly because everybody’s treating it like a joke instead of committing. By its structure (the reblog system) Tumblr is a place of collaboration and building upon what’s come before. TikTok, on the other hand, favors a personalized algorithm pushing viral content over content creators. It’s about reaching the top of a trend or a sound before it dies off in two weeks.

It just rubs me the wrong way how some people act like Zepotha’s crime is being a shitty copy of Goncharov. This is the Fanfiction website. We love amateurism and “originality” means nothing to us. We should be happy to celebrate the people on there making genuine attempts at TikTok edits of the characters or those TikTok green screen filter reviews of the movie or ‘dressing like Zepotha characters’ vids instead of denigrating Zepotha for being too derivative. There are genuine tiktoks out there that do a great job of committing to the bit and crystallizing what fandom formats on TikTok look like, which is exactly what the Goncharov screenshot redraws, horny comics, and queer metas were on Tumblr.

Like, there’s so much to rag against Zepotha—the inauthenticity, the clout-chasing, the way TikTok’s virality algorithm makes art worse, the lack of in-universe TikToks calling out the Zepotha fans for being racist (I’d kill for that TikTok skit!)—that roasting the amateur execution of excited teens is missing the forest for the trees.

[artistsfuneral]

I'd really like to know how many people actually buy tumblr merch and why?

Because every time I see the header for the shop I want to support this hellside, but I would never spend money on anything that's currently in the shop. Which leads me to the question why the merch is so.... questionable? Because right now I could think of at least 10 things that would be really cool and that I'd gladly buy, knowing the money supports an app I use daily.

But a bumper sticker that looks like it was made with mspaint? No thanks.

Why not Goncharov Movie Tickets?

Stickers or Magnets of the app icon, the anon face, those weird profile pics when you first create a blog?

More than that one ugly pair of socks?

Sticky notes? Ballpoint pens? Postcards? Art prints?

That stuff is so easy to design and on the inexpensive side of production. No one wants tumblr live, or scrolling through videos by swiping up and down.

[maxwell-grant]

What a lot of people don’t seem to understand about Goncharov is that it isn’t just “another Scorsese gangster film” (which in itself is a pretty gross oversimplification), it was a crucial part of the pivotal point of his career as a director. It was Scorsese applying everything he learned about effective low-budget filmmaking from Roger Corman (who co-produced Goncharov as well, albeit uncredited) during the making of Boxcar Bertha, as well as applying John Cassavetes’ advice on making the genre films he wanted to make rather than the more documentary/autobiography works he’d done so far.

With Corman’s assistance (himself notorious for being able to stitch new films together out of scrapped footage from old ones), in 1973 he was able to finish and release two films: Mean Streets, and Goncharov, both films sharing actors, sets, even small bits of footage. Mean Streets happened to be the classic that would launch his career, and Goncharov would remain mostly forgotten until now.

Now, we all know of course that Goncharov got tangled up in international copyright issues from the get-go, with the 1983 and the 1996 recolors only further complicating things as the movie got passed around to different studios, and by that point there wasn’t much Scorsese could even do to get the film back and he was tangled up in a lot of other projects (although some theorize this as one of the reasons why Scorsese would later go on to notoriously champion film restoration and preservation, knowing firsthand what it’s like to have a passion project fall through the cracks and be taken away from you).

Still, the movie did have a limited release in the US and Canada (with a pretty strong fanbase in Winnipeg, actually, for the past decades most of the available copies of Goncharov came from VHS releases in Winnipeg, although very poorly preserved), and it wasn’t terribly well received at the time either. Even if these odd strokes of fate hadn’t destroyed Goncharov’s release I doubt the film would have fared that well much the same.

Where as Mean Streets reads like a blueprint for Scorcese’s gritty masculine hits like Taxi Driver and Goodfellas, Goncharov in many ways feels more in line with Scorsese’s more oddball projects like King of Comedy and Hugo, actually it really does have more in common with Hugo than his other crime films. I think part of why Goncharov’s become popular on Tumblr lately is because it’s remarkably, whimsical? It’s a weird way to describe a movie that gets so dark but, it feels way more grounded in fantasy than his other works (it even has that clock motif that Scorsese would later use in Hugo)

The name itself is a tribute to filmmaker Vasily Goncharov, a film pioneer from the Soviet Union. Goncharov was the first filmmaker to record a film using two cameras and use sound effects, he’d directed the first feature film made in Russian history as well as the first blockbuster with 1812. This was the period where Scorsese was hanging out with De Palma and it shows because there’s a lot of scenes in Goncharov that are explicitly in tribute to Goncharov’s works like Ivan the Terrible and Khas Bulat.

Some of you are wondering where do the queer elements in Goncharov come from or why is Katya unusually pro-active for a Scorsese female lead (or even why this film has a female lead at all when so many of his other works don’t really have one), that’s a side effect of this movie’s debt to Goncharov’s works, particularly Charodeyka (The Enchantress). Katya is basically Scorsese’s take on the Nastasya / Charodeyka character.

In the fifteenth century, Nikita, the vice-regent of Novgorod, and his son Yuri fall in love with Nastasya, the owner of a local inn. But Nastasya is actually the sorceress Charodeyka. The local deacon Mamirov tells Nikita’s wife about Nastasya, and the wife poisons her. She dies in Yuri’s arms, and the enraged Nikita kills Yuri - Jess Nevins, on Charodeyka (1909), description taken from The Encyclopedia of Pulp Heroes

Albeit described as “evil” and being depicted as a witch, Charodeyka bears no blame for any of the tragedy that happens in the movie, she just happens to be a beautiful woman targeted by dangerous affections of men and women alike (the movie does go some way towards showing it isn’t just jealousy that drives Nikita’s wife to murder Charodeyka) while bearing a secret of her own. I’m not saying Charodeyka was a queer tragedy by any means, but it is a tragedy of doomed love affairs and toxic family relationships and that seems to be what Goncharov’s playing with (Scorsese’s Goncharov cut out the implied incest and I’d say that was for the better).

This is kind of why Katya Goncharova kinda feels a little disconnected from Goncharov’s narrative up until the point they first meet and their fates intertwine tragically. Instead of a witch, she’s a femme fatale, and it damns her much the same just as Goncharov’s past catches up to him. It isn’t quite a remake but it’s taking a lot from Charodeyka and Ivan the Terrible and Vasily Goncharov’s other works, and Scorsese didn’t quite manage to blend these influences and tributes smoothly into the story, which is why the movie is kind of all over-the-place in a way that makes describing it make it seem like it’s an epistolary shitpost, which it very much isn’t.

It’s, among all the other things people have described it as, Scorsese’s oddball love letter to his influences as well as an important yet forgotten parts of film history (it’s not for nothing that Goncharov attempts suicide by train). Obviously, for many reasons, it was never going to catch on the way Mean Streets did, but it is fascinating nonetheless and I’m glad to see it’s been rediscovered.

[thatnerdinthecorner]

you know what i make fun of tiktok a lot, bc most of the time it deserves it, but i think that a lot of people on tumblr could use some time on tiktok. a little bit of exposure.

the majority of tumblr users have been here a while and i know we all said that we wouldnt do the whole millenial vs gen z vs whatever comes next thing, but theres a whole lot of people on here taking things from tiktok out of context and going 'oh no look at the next generation, look how terrible' and then saying how awful tiktok is. and tiktok is awful. but its awful bc it harvests data, and is super addictive, and is fucking up the music and publishing industries, and not, i repeat not, bc the younger generation are just so terrible

yeah the whole goncharov rip off was boring and inauthentic and we all made fun of it, but the whole girl dinner and girl math thing. No.

girl dinner isnt promoting eating disorders. are there people with eating disorders that are using the girl dinner trend, yeah, but idk if you know this but any food related trend is going to have people with eating disorders jump on in there, and whilst there are definitely things we can do to mitigate the success of them spreading their gross diets and whatever the next fad laxative is, we shouldnt stop having fun with food just bc any food trend online can be done by people with eating disorders too.

girl dinner isnt some evil trad wife trend, its the exact opposite. women arent using the 'girl' in girl dinner to say la lala la laa look at me, im a little girly who only likes pink and not thinking, la dee da

they use it to say there are certain expectations that we have been taught women have to be beholden to, the idea of the perfect woman who can do it all, raise the kids, do the housework, have the full time job as well, but the kids and housework are full time jobs, and this is exhausting, and heres what i make for dinner when im too tired to cook a full meal, when living up to all the expectations is hard, bc im human, im not perfect, and if its not what a perfect adult woman would do then i guess im not, so heres me eating my girl dinner and i wont be ashamed of that, bc the patriarchy feeds on our shame, and if we arent ashamed of being the perfect woman under patriarchy, then at least in that way, it does not control us, if patriarchy is the panopticon then if we dont fear the watchman, we will never become our own watchman

ill admit, i know less about girl math, bc its popped up less for me (i think its a trend fewer people do, but it could just be the algorithm), but from what i can tell its basically just social/behavioural economics. it illustrates things like the sunk cost fallacy, eg. if ive already put money on an app to pay for my coffee then that coffee is 'free'. the people making those videos dont literally think their coffee it free, they're just saying it feels like its free, which it does, because of the sunk cost fallacy. thats not women being stupid, thats an actual theory in behavioral economics. i've also seen people talk about 'its cheaper to buy something else and get free shipping than to pay less but not get free shipping'. they don't literally think that, and its kind of insulting the amount of people there are seeing women make that joke and immediately assuming that they are too stupid to be joking.

[valya-dudycz-lupescu]

A Little Goncharov for Thanksgiving

I learned about Goncharov the way I learn about most memes and pop culture, from my teenagers. In the days leading up to Thanksgiving, we had a group chat spring up on Discord that included two family friends who were going to be joining us for the holiday from out of town. One of the topics of conversation turned to Goncharov, the imaginary film around which an active Tumblr fan community had sprung up, as if it had been a real, little-known cult classic from 1973 made by Martin Scorsese. 

It became a fun creative exercise—in the middle of the day, one of the kids would send a question about Goncharov: “What do you think about the relationship between Katya and Sofia?” or “What did you make of the clock tower imagery?” or “Goncharov… iphone or android guy?” To which someone else would playfully answer. 

This same kind of thing was happening on a massive scale on Tumblr, where artists created movie posters and promotional materials, composers posted songs and soundtracks, people posted deleted scenes and script fragments. There are reviews and academic papers, fictitious Wikipedia and IMDb listings, and A LOT of fan art.

Lynda Carter posted a photo on her Tumblr with Henry Winkler that she captioned, “Me and ‘The Fonz’ at the premiere of Goncharov (1973) at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre.”

Discussions popped up about the characters and who would play them in the reboot. Posts were shared hundreds, then thousands of times. A Goncharov (1973) Lore Google Doc and Discord server were created to help keep the content organized.

Our family’s fan-favorite character was Ice-Pick Joe, so I wrote “Musings on Ice-Pick Joe” in between chopping veggies for stuffing and waiting for the sweet potatoes to roast, complete with some AI-generated art. That was four days ago, and the post has been liked and shared more than I anticipated, and I keep thinking about why that is.

Conversations around Goncharov have continued, and I find myself wondering what it is about this moment in time and this type of activity that continues to capture so many people’s imagination and engagement?

Tumblr is a hub for public fandom culture and community in a way that the other social media platforms are not. It’s where you can find discourse and fanfiction/fanart for almost anything.

Still, this is a little different and on a much larger scale. At a time when people are looking for Twitter alternatives, with the stress and joy of holidays approaching, what is drawing so many people in?

We talked about this over Thanksgiving: the way Goncharov allowed people low-stakes permission to create, to play to their particular strengths, to connect with other people, to escape reality for a moment, to build a new community. We talked about the shortcomings and challenges we saw: power dynamics, issues of race, etc.

It’s an evolving experiment, and as such, it has been shaped by the many variables involved and course-corrected each time someone notices a gap or opportunity: What would a musical look like? What if some of the actors had gone on Sesame Street or the Muppet Show? What if Gonzo played Goncharov and Miss Piggy played Katya? What would the remake look like set in 1980s NYC? What recipes might be created for the Goncharov cookbook? (I remember how much fun we had making the Forking Good cookbook.) There really is no end to what people can come up with. I’m waiting to see if Goncharov gets a Tom Gauld comic or a mention on Saturday Night Live. 

It seems relevant that role-playing games, both online and tabletop, have recently increased in popularity. Dungeons and Dragons was the cornerstone of Stranger Things, and 50,000 people attended Gen Con (tabletop game convention) in 2022. It’s not my world, although I’ve watched the joy my kids take in it. My energy goes into writing, but I can absolutely appreciate the fun of playing together. 

As a writer, I walk around with worlds in my head, but I don’t get to share them until they get published. Something like Goncharov, which was not an intellectual property “owned” by anyone, gives people permission to imagine and play.

I think it speaks to a need we have an human beings to experience connection, joy, wonder, and hope. We've always had those needs. People have been gathering around fires or tables, telling stories, for thousands of years.

Today, the hearth may be a computer or a phone, but the desire is not that different. My November began with the publication of Mother Christmas, my graphic novel, the secret origin of the Santa Claus story which is rooted in the ancient Muses, whose gifts inspire humanity. One of the questions my story attempts to answer is: Where does inspiration come from?

If we look at Goncharov we can see that inspiration comes from so many places. So much is possible when people given themselves permission to play, to shrug off the inner critics and outer trolls, and to imagine for a moment a different world that they have a part in creating. That is such a powerful and compelling idea.

Stories remind us that we are not alone, that we share struggles, and that we can overcome obstacles. There are so many challenges in the world right now.

Maybe Goncharov is a lens through which people are seeing themselves and each other, reminding us how much fun it is to make-believe and how powerful it can be to have a shared image of the world.

The first step in creation is imagining. Exercising that muscle, allowing ourselves to play and tell stories and make art is a worthwhile one, and I think it's one that we need to survive.  The Goncharov phenomenon gives me hope, because if we can have this many people put their energy into creating a whole world around Goncharov, just imagine what else is possible?

[zagreus-eats-your-bread]

I want extensive Scongo lore, I realize that I probably won't understand much bc I'm not intumately familiar with classic who or EU stuff, but Scongo sounds too iconic

Omg you're in for a wild ride and I am the perfect person to ask. This post probably won't be 100% complete tho bc its 6am and I am omw to work but I'll include some sources so you can become a real Scongler (Scongo scholar, not a real term I just made that up)

So Scongo (the best villain) is a fake, made up Dr Who character that was made up by the members of the TARDISposting Facebook group in 2017. The image is admin Joe Brennans friend Lenny but his face is made all weird:

The gig was basically to troll people of the main Dr Who Facebook group, many of which were elitist and kept calling people who didn't know every single classic who episode "fake fans", by claiming they are fake fans for not knowing about the iconic 60s villain Scongo.

Similar to tumblrs new Goncharov meme, TARDISposters were making up fake stories to go along with this fake villain to more successfully gaslight normal fans into thinking he is real. Quick side note in case you are wondering why hes called Scongo. It's just a silly name that they came up with that sounds Dr Whoey, it's not deep.

Sometime, I don't know when, they also made up Scongos brother/lover (no doubt a reference to the master, who writers tried to make the doctor's brother some time) the Wibbler, using a different picture of Lenny and a different effect on his face:

Now therere few iconic details about Scongo that no Scongo fan should be ignorant about, like his powerful Bongos, for example.

During Scongos Genesis (referring to both the creation period of Scongo as well as the iconic 80s episode) people were making fan art and shit, and the TARDISposting admins even recorded an audio drama called the Age of Scongo.

Another iconic thing to be aware about is the amount of Doctor Wbo actors who were asked to say Scongo is the best villain at cons, of which Colin Baker was the most enthusiastic imo. You can see all of the actors up to 2020 in Joes Scongo Video, which is a good resource to just watch entirely too.

Around spring 2018, I believe, TARDISposters got tired of the joke and it kinda faded and lay dormant for a while.

Fast forward to 2020, Scongo is suddenly back again. Many new memes are coming out (you gotta understand that lot of Scongo stuff is tied to the kinds of memes that were also going on in TARDISposting at the time, which is why someone asked Salad Man from The Woman Who Fell To Earth to say Scongo is the best villain, for example), there was even talks of an Age of Scongo sequel, which would turn out to be kinda hard since one of the admins who played i think Nardole in the first part? got kicked for being a weird pervert who sends gross messages to female members (something that got memed endlessly as well at his expense and was pretty funny).

Me, a member of Facebook and TARDISposting since just after the Scongo meme died and who was aware of him for a long time by then, I was thrilled by this and immediately introduced Scongo to my Discord server "looms".

This would be the start of the best era for the then only about 3 months old looms Discord server, as well as a pretty funny era for TARDISposting, with a few big problems for them which are also pretty funny to me.

So lets start with the new stuff on the Facebook side of things. A Scongo redbubble shop was opened, including breathtaking Scongle merch such as a bedsheet and a coffe to-go cup. There was also a TARDISposting Discord without rules that got, iirc, immediately spammed with scat porn so that rules were instated and memes were made about the ban of said material. Joe Brennan even joined the looms discord and is still there but hasn't written since 2020.

Simultaniously looms was taking the idea of Scongo and going crazy with it. We thought it unacceptable that the AO3 tag for Scongo was empty so we filled it. We made our own contributions to the Scongoverse which TARDISposting doesn't even know about, using a member of the server and turning them into Chad, a being of ant-time (as a parody of Zagreus, a real Dr Who character and being of anti-time) and the CEO of Chad Books, the publisher of Longbooby (Lungbarrow). There's a lot of silly stuff connected to this, lots of lore in the confines of the looms discord and it was a big time for looms social media but this is about Scongo, not looms.

There are 2 things that resulted from looms' contribution that you need to know about. The first is the Scongo era coming to Tumblr, something which we back then called the Scongo Renaissance. The second is the downfall of the TARDISposting Facebook group.

See, 2020 was a big year for transphobia, especially in Britain. TARDISposting was handling it as well as they could, kicking all the tories for example, which lead to a knock off tory TARDISposting and it's all very funny and pathetic. But this destableized TARDISposting. The critical hit would be served by my good bestie @factkinparadoxx posting the following meme:

It immediately sparked discussions, a lot of people reported one another leading finally to the banning of TARDISposting and Joe Brennan for terrorism (? Yeah.)

I personally was asleep through the whole ordeal, waking to only this post at the top of my facebook timeline and a broken link to the TARDISposting group, as it was no longer there. Here's a message from the admin to Clem that I found while looking for the meme that killed TARDISposting just now:

So following the death of TARDISposting a new group was made and there were some Scongo memes but after it died a lot of people didn't find the new group and after a while I stopped using Facebook so I can't give you any updates on Scongle Facebook.

The recent Goncharov meme, however, is opening a door to what I'd like to describe as the Scongo Enlightenment, a perfect time for Scongo to make a comeback on tumblr.

If you would like to know more about Scongo you may consult the Scongo page on TARDISposting wiki or the only archived version of TARDISposting before the disaster that i could find rn. There is also probably a live and active TARDISposting on Facebook right now if you look for it. But don't feel like you need to know any Scongo "canon" to participate. Just make shit up.

Any other true Sconglers can reblog this with additions or iconic Scongo memes that I didn't care to look for atm. Sconge on.

[thisweekinfandomhistory]

Hello, I’ve been really enjoying your podcast and thinking about various incidents that might make for good episode topics and how they could be approached, and since you seem rather receptive to random suggestions, I figured I’d send some in.

The Black Sails vs OFMD tumblr poll, a recent incident where a tumblr poll pitting two pirated against each other caused mountains of drama, a massive unhinged rant from the op of the poll, and a sort of fandom rivalry. Could be useful as a jumping off point to talk about the way comedy and dramas are perceived in fandom spaces and the ethical issues that spring up around media that whitewashes (in the moral sense, but the other definition could play into the discussion too), completely fictionalizes, and glamorizes real historical figures.

More Star Trek stuff than I can recall in one sitting, but Die Seven Die! was a pretty crazy happening, where a bunch of shippers decided to write fanfic of a certain character dying because she got in the way of their ship (she got randomly paired up with a character she didn’t interact with much, and the rumor is it’s because the actor who played him made a joke about it while negotiating his paycheck). The 1982 Con of Wrath, just a classic convention fuck up. And really, just any given thing happening with Spock’s love life at any given time. I know people got extremely nasty regarding the Kelvin Timeline’s Spock/Uhura stuff and more recently with Spock/Chapel.

I think the release date of the first Big Finish audiodrama could make for a good starting point for an episode about the dr who wilderness years, which could focus on the role fan activity can have in rebooting or reviving a dead series. Or, on a crazier note to reach the same point, the release of the music video for Doctor in Distress, which is something I really can’t describe beyond “a compellingly awful charity song made to get Doctor Who back on the air”, and Hans Zimmer was involved in making it.

I’m sure you’ve gotten suggestions for Thanfiction and the Hamilton AIDS incident a thousand times, but how about the time Voltron fans tried to reinvent the concept of original fiction through the lens of fanfiction. As I understand it they were so upset by the ending of the show that they decided to collectively file the serial numbers off of their fandom. Sort of replacing the actual show with a invented goncharov-thing and writing fanfic for the fake fandom they made. Not sure what ultimate point could be derived from that, but it’s sure fascinating from a sociological point of view.

Thank you for writing in!! Sorry it's taken a little while to reply; we didn't want to spoil too many of our own upcoming episodes in our answer, but it's rude to leave you hanging, so here we go... :)

The Black Sails versus OFMD poll is a great suggestion! And I love your take on how comedy and drama are totally perceived differently in fannish spaces and have such, like, essentially different modes of fandom. It would also definitely have to touch on how OFMD in particular whitewashes real-world slaveowners -- although if we do a Hamilton episode, we'd probably talk about that a lot there, too.

Thank you for sending in some new Star Trek stuff! I (V) hadn't heard of any of those particular events, so I'm excited to dig in and take a look. :)

And I love that suggestion for a Doctor Who event! It's been surprisingly hard to find a good record of fannish history, rather than show history, for DW, which is insane considering what a huge fandom it's had for so many decades.

Thanfiction and the HIVliving Scandal are already on the 2023 schedule, have no fear!

But this Voltron thing sounds nutty. ::pencils it in::

[bondsmagii]

Please give me the forbidden Goncharov discourse 👀

so for context, this comes from a post by tumblr user lastoneout that reads:

turns out tumblr does have reading comprehension and the ability to analyze a complex text through multiple frameworks and have a nuanced discussion while doing so but apparently we were all saving it up to have nuanced discussions about a fake movie with no actual text to analyze

and then my tags on the post, which read:

#this is so funny but i maintain it's the only unrealistic thing about goncharov (1973) #like you mean to tell me the fandom on tumblr is this huge and yet there's not one hate blog? #there's not a core group of haters posting the most deranged piss on the poor shit in the tag? #no discourse? no anon hate? #christ but there's not a single poc in it come on tumblr i've not seen a single person get called a racist for liking it #this is a glimpse into what peace on planet earth would look like #(ironically i do have some deep analysis for why this might be but i will spare op lmao)

now forgive me if this makes no sense, because this is the first time I have tried to articulate it before, and of course in keeping with the theme it's about a fake movie (cinematic masterpiece Goncharov, (1973) dir. Martin Scorsese).

with the obvious out of the way first: Goncharov is a fictional movie, it does not exist, and therefore there it nothing to say about the real-world issues associated with lack of representation. this means we can skip that in actuality, though if we're looking at it from the perspective of a real movie and how it would be regarded on Tumblr, I'm sure that there would be related discourse. however, this is not real, so we can focus on the more entertaining, light-hearted sides of fandom. and this is universally what Goncharov posts were like: gifsets, fanart, humorous and well-written textual analysis, deep and pretentious photosets and quotes, everything that you love to see. but it was odd, in terms of realism, that there were no haters at all. which made me wonder: why are there haters when it comes to real things, but not when it comes to fake ones? part of this is what's mentioned above: in real life, there are some dynamics and trends and issues that can and do have a very real impact on society, or represent aspects of society that should change. but I can't help think it was something else, too.

I mentioned in my tags hate blogs specifically, because in real fandoms, you can easily find hate blogs that have absolutely nothing to do with any real, tangible criticism. it is just vitriolic hate: of a character, of a book/film, of an actor or actress involved, or some combination of these. there's no actual criticism, and very often there are massive feats of mental gymnastics used to make fans of [character] or [thing] look bad. it is just seething hatred, all directed towards something that is supposed to be entertainment; it's supposed to be fun! so why do some people take something harmless and make their entire personalities about hating it -- as well as spending significant parts of their day talking shit, getting into arguments, and even sending anon hate and threats to fans? it's because there are some people out there who like to hate things. they don't seem to like having fun. anything fun that comes their way, they have to pick holes in it; they have to have something negative to say to it. deep down, they know this is a very sad way to live. they know there's a difference between being a casual hater who likes to bitch about things in private with friends, or make the occasional joke or rant online -- and running a literal blog dedicated to hating something. they know there's a difference and they don't want to admit that they're losers, so they dress it up as something noble. these days, it's usually activism. this also explains the mental gymnastics, the reaches, the "fans of [character] are -ist or -phobic" shit. they're applying a thin coat of legitimacy to the fact that they're irrationally angry about something completely pointess, and there are a lot of people out there who seem to think this is a good and beneficial way to spend their time.

even among fans, there are some who seem to be having a bad time. I have looked at certain posts or blogs before and wondered to myself if the person even actually likes it, or if at this point they're just hostage to nostalgia or the idea of it (either the potential or their fan version of the universe) and they can't just call it quits. these people are not the same as the previously described, as they don't make their whole lives about hating something, but they're clearly miserable and could do with moving on, and they do contribute to the kinds of critical and often aggressive posts missing from the Goncharov project. the absence of this, as well as the more unhinged hatred, does leave a pretty obvious gap in the believability of the film's existence, and this is... rather depressing, really.

the thing that allowed Goncharov to be a peaceful experience was because of the fact that it wasn't real, and everyone knew it. but this should be applied to all films and books: they are not real. while some criticisms are valid (such as the terrible writing that female characters are often subject to, or the lack of representation in popular cinema, etc) a lot of the hate comes from interpersonal beef about characters, and these people aren't real. it's a very strange thing to witness: that so many people are capable of understanding that Goncahrov and Katya etc aren't real, and therefore there's no point getting mad about them, but they cannot carry that over to any other fictional character. the film's unreality is part of the joke, woven into it from the foundations, and so no hater, no matter how deranged, could possibly take themselves seriously hating it. instead they have to resort to complaining about the joke itself, and how annoying it is, but the content remains completely hater-free. it's an absolutely fascinating glimpse at the complete breakdown of the line between reality and fiction on this website -- Goncharov came from within, and its construction and creation was there for all to see, whereas other media seems to spring to the consumer fully formed and therefore with some kind of mystery that awards it a certain flair of legitimacy. I don't mean to say that anyone thinks it's real, but certainly they seem to think it's more serious, and worth getting worked up over. but none of it is real, none of it is worth getting worked up over, but for some reason it seems that when a creation comes from one's peers, this mystery is removed and the complete pointlessness and inanity of getting into fights online over fictional characters and events is illuminated in all its glory.

[daughter-of-sapph0]

Hello~ I hope you're having a nice evening!! I wanted to ask you about tumblr eras because I've seen you mention them a couple times now. I've been on tumblr for a while now actually but haven't seen anyone else refer to tumblr eras, and I was wondering if you could explain them? No worries if not!!

of course!

so, I'm probably one of a handful of people who actually uses tumblr eras. I use it as a shorthand to describe when certain events happened and the people who joined before or after those events

Era 1 is from the beginning of tumblr until dashcon. this was from 2007 to 2014 and is the longest era so far. it's notable for the creation of superwholock, the mishapocolypse, oncelercest, and more. it's the first thing people thing of when they think of classic tumblr

Era 2 is from after dashcon until the community guidelines change in late 2018 (aka the "porn ban"). this is actually when I joined (I was originally an undertale blogger). this is notable for the more popular fandoms of tumblr, and some incredibly famous posts like the bone stealing shit or John Green's cock post. it ended when the community guidelines changed to ban "female presenting nipples" and a lot of people left for twitter

Era 3 is honestly when tumblr was at its best. it's when most of the inside jokes were created (eebby deeby, horse plinko, Goncharov, etc). even though tumblr wasn't insanely popular at this time, it had a real sense of community and togetherness that can't really be said about any other websites.

Era 4 is the newest era and the one we're currently in. this was started when elon musk bought twitter and tons of people left and either rejoined tumblr or joined for the first time. this was also the same time tumblr started trying out a lot more new features like tipping, blazing, tumblr blue, and livestreams. I have no idea where tumblr will go from here. I hope that the new users can embrace tumblr's weirdness and that the staff won't introduce a bunch of useless features that kill the site. we'll just have to see.

me and some of my friends are currently making a timeline that will showcase all these eras and most important tumblr events from the start of tumblr to the modern day.

but again, the concept of tumblr eras is something I made up and isn't that widespread.

thank you for asking. I hope that makes sense.

[weedle-testaburger]

Can you explain to me what is this Goncharev thing? Is it some kind of movie or TV show? What makes it so popular on Tumblr right now?

Goncharov? Well, basically it started out as a funny post someone made about some bootleg shoes with a promotion for a nonexistent movie on them:

Out of nowhere last week, people decided to start making posts about Goncharov acting as if it's a real movie. They came up with a cast, posters, characters, fanart, quotes and lots of analysis and discourse posts about scenes that are supposedly in it. It's basically like an ARG but played for laughs, and I think it's so funny because it's a fandom you don’t have to consume anything for besides fandom posts. Like Tumblr has finally gotten to the point we've skipped there being a thing to have a fandom about and invented one out of thin air, I'm just surprised it took us 14 years thinking about it.

[brinconvenient]

FOR THE LAST TIME! MARTIN SCORSESE DID NOT DIRECT GONCHAROV!

I wrote all of this on a reblog of a great post  by @mortalityplays that explains how Twitter’s broken copyright protection system is finally letting the world appreciate the up-til-recently lost film “Goncharov,” but it was a reblog, so I don’t think enough people are seeing this. And honestly, it’s just like tumblr to go hog wild on a media property without knowing even a scintilla of the actual history of it. 

I know that Martin Scorsese is getting a lot of love for tumblr’s favorite new rediscovered film, but (and I can't believe I have to fucking go all filmbro on this, but I fell down a hyper-fixation rabbit hole on this a while back) what's pissing me off about all of this, is that everyone, including op, keeps giving Martin Scorsese credit as the director, when the title card clearly shows "Martin Scorsese Presents" (I think it's the snippet in the 3rd tweet, maybe the 4th) which means that Martin Scorsese was the DISTRIBUTOR.

Like. Ok, so Scorsese graduates film school roughly the same time as George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola, Brian DePalma, and the rest of the Movie Brats, coming up with Steven Spielberg etc, launching the American auteur era of film, but smack in the middle of research for Mean Streets, Scorsese encounters this film by the mononymic Italian director, Matteo (JWHJ0715 was his member id number in Italy's version of the Director's Guild of America - pretty sure they stopped requiring directors include their guild number in the credits after Fellini refused for like 20 years and they just gave up trying to fine him. This is also what inspired Lucas to cow the DGA into submission on the credits at the end thing for Star Wars).

And Scorsese is just fucking blown away. Like, it's everything he's wanted to do since he went into film school. The symbolism, the interpersonal intrigue, the conflicting loyalties between love, honor and duty, the family you are born into vs. the mafia family that finds, accepts and trains you, the constant ethical tension between doing what's right for your morality and what's right for YOUR family vs. what's right For the Family.

I mean. Jesus, look at Goodfellas if you want to see how Scorsese tries to touch on SOME OF THAT when he finally feels like he knows enough to even attempt to approach Matteo's mastery.

Of course, that's not even touching on the Cold War intrigue about the Russian mob operating outside of Soviet Russia and the whole KGB subplot aspect of it all.

Anyway, so back to 1972. Scorsese is just absolutely blown away. The Godfather has just come out and America is mafia mad! Scorsese has had some modest hits. He thinks that Mean Streets is gonna be his big break, and he sees this movie. Not only does he dump his original lead actor to cast Robert Deniro because of it, he decides that he's gonna use the connections he's been making to get this film in front of American movie goers, to help finance the films he wants to make.

So he just, he just fuckin COLD CALLS Dominico Procacci and says "I know people and I can get this movie seen over here" and Procacci takes the meeting... Like, the balls on Martin!

But Procacci doesn't tell him that the real Russian mafia is already sniffing around. Anyway, Scorsese gets the distribution rights for the US and starts getting prints made and ready to distribute to prop up the mob-movie-fever so he can ride it when Mean Streets hits later in the year.

Like, the film was already in cans and at the theater, when the Russian mob knocks on Marty's door and have a very convincing conversation with him.

Next thing you know, all of the prints are back at the warehouse where, reportedly, the fucking Russian mob counts each and every single one. Then they toss the fucking master on the pile (I don't know where they got that, does anyone have that story??) and set it all alight, while Marty watches his future go up in flames.

But then they just fucking walk away and Martin Scorsese, with britches full, goes back to his car and doesn't even see the bag of cash in the backseat until the next day. Business concluded.

Gotta give Old Ivan credit. Just like Matteo depicted - they keep their fucking word. Martin Scorsese decided to stick to the Italian and Irish mobs in his movies from then on, and leave the god damned Ruskies alone.

Of course, none of them knew about the test prints back at the warehouse of the company that was hired to make the copies for American distribution. I could be wrong, but isn't the leading theory about the provenance of the Twitter copy that someone probably found one of those test prints in some corporate asset auction or something?

Anyway, sorry for the ramble. I just hate seeing Matteo getting left out of the fucking conversation, especially now that arguably his greatest work is finally getting attention.

Scorsese has been basically fanfic AU-ing "Goncharov" his whole fucking career and now he's gonna get actually credit for the original? Not on my fucking watch, thank you.

[duhragonball]

I found the zamazu saga easier to watch then gt because I could at least not think and just go: oooohhh pretty light show. Like a moth. Unfortunately that's how I've gotten around most of the bad writing, is ooohhh pretty light show, or growing to like a character. (I.e: Buu) but I get it, it's like watching the live action atla at times.

I mean, yeah, a lot of people seem to enjoy Zamasu/Goku Black as a character, or the arc as a whole. I don't get it, and I feel like a jerk if I accuse them of not paying attention while they watched it. There's a Tumblr Sexyman vibe to Zamasu, and Goncharov has shown us that fans can derive enjoyment out of things that may not even exist. So even a bad run of a show can still get people on board.

For my part, it's a lot easier for me to just roll with it when it's something like Super Dragon Ball Heroes, where they're not even trying to pretend this is a coherent story with continuity or stakes. I still don't understand how Zamasu is even in SDBH, and the character even refuses to explain it when asked, but somehow that makes him a lot easier to take.

Maybe the problem here is that DBS presented itself as this official continuation of DB continuity, which means it has a lot more to prove than it would if it were a silly side story. One of the weaker movies can get a pass because it's kind of a standalone side-story, but a genuine sequel has to measure up to the original. It doesn't just have to be well-made; it has to justify its own claim to be a continuation worth telling.

The Star Wars sequel trilogy has that problem. Movies like Rogue One and Solo can kind of get a free pass, but when you name your movie "Episode VII" you're asking the audience for a lot of their trust. In this case the Zamasu arc was presented as the direct continuation of Future Trunks' storyline in DBZ, and people had a lot of strong feelings about what that needs to be. I know I wanted to see Trunks acknowledge his career in the Time Patrol, because I like that version of events better. Other fans surely had their own ideas for what should happen to him next, and other fans probably wondered what the point was with even continuing his story at all. So you're almost guaranteed to tick someone off no matter what you do with the character in that arc.

[fiftysevenacademics]

The first thing I saw Sunday morning was about the Club Q shooting. My eyes welled up and I struggled to hold back tears as I told my wife, still sensibly cozy in bed, about the tragedy. I felt even more broken and desperate inside about this one because it hit so close to home.

Since moving to our new house, someone threw a muffin or piece of cake at our truck, which has a pride flag sticker, and carved a profanity on our trash bin. Are these just random acts of some dumbasses doing dumbass stuff? Or are we going to be murdered one day by someone who won't let even one queer couple live on their street? Believe it or not, I tend to be an optimist and also default to the most reasonable, likely interpretation of events so have favored the "it was a dumbass" interpretation but then things like this happen and make me paranoid.

I opened Tumblr, expecting it already awash with grief, outrage, and commentary, and instead saw the Goncharov boots post. We went out, managed to enjoy our day, and when I returned, my dash was 99% Goncharov. No mention of Club Q anywhere. Nor did anyone appear to be getting scolded for enjoying the meme instead of doom posting about the tragedy. 

I don't know if the two are related but I think it's important not to let hatred, violence, and fear steal all our joy. I feel so hopeless all the time nowadays-- fascism, climate change, extreme class inequality and the increasingly unlivable nature of life in America, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny... I can't go one day without learning about something that crushes my soul a little bit more.

But in just one day we created a whole world that brought us together as a community, made us laugh, and allowed us to revel in each other's creativity.

It's like we collectively decided that Tumblr is no longer the default place where we process trauma and is, instead, the default place where we create joy when the outside world is too painful to bear. 

[rookthethird]

the earliest recorded game of Goncharov. also, I'm lying

Goncharov (1973) motion picture score

What follows is an essay on the earliest known game of Goncharov. Also, I'm lying.

~

I'm obsessed with this essay-game -- On Goncharov by Hy Libre!

Even that Frankensteined term feels like an incomplete answer to the question "what is this piece to me?" (A question I asked myself, of course. This will be a recurrent theme.) Whatever I call it, this thing hit me squarely in the ribcage because I've played Goncharov before. 

Please indulge me. I want to tell you about another seed.

Our freshman year of high school, my deranged theatre friends and I played Goncharov for an audience of one: our friend, my recurrent scene partner, and our theatre group's "leading man" -- Jeff. To this day, several of us remain fierce friends and constant collaborators, including Jeff and I. He is one of the most blisteringly skilled artists I know.

Together, our ragtag crew (minus our target) made up an anime called Demon Tomes. We embellished the stage with fanart, headcanon rants, and even one whole gif. It worked. Jeff believed and, much to our delight, joined us in the fandom. But now, as I'm writing this a decade later, a thought occurs. Did Jeff ever search for a Demon Tomes tag on Tumblr? We were all active in various fandoms there; surely his first instinct would be to search for footholds? 

Either he never bothered to investigate beyond our conversations, or he made the arguably "stronger" choice as a performer: he searched for this cool new anime, found nothing, andjoined the scene anyway.

We knew/know him very well. We crafted Demon Tomes specifically for him. In retrospect, that curation probably sold the fantasy. Drawing each frame for that gif of the Caretaker smoking, I didn't have Jeff at the top of my mind, but he was  there nonetheless. Swimming somewhere fathoms deep.

But perhaps if you're quick when spotting ethical quicksand or familiar with the emotional dangers of method acting, you've already called foul in your head. And I wouldn't blame you! Perhaps if you were here with me, you'd say -- Hey Rook, the difference between Goncharov and Demon Tomes is that the former involves thousands of willing players who are in on the joke, whereas the latter involves one unwitting player who is perhaps the punchline. Couldn't that be considered a gaslighting prank? 

I have thought about this a lot myself. I put myself in Jeff's old boots and ask, "would I enjoy this if I were in Jeff's position?" 

Spoiler: Jeff did. This is more evidence for him knowing all along. He expressed nothing but delight from overture to plot twist to curtain call. And he absolutely could and would fool us jesters like that. He once had me guessing his three middle names based on initials for years, only to yank me offstage with a casual "oh, you already guessed them years ago, but I won't tell you which guess."

So Jeff loved Demon Tomes, and perhaps he was the director all along. But Jeff and I are very different in many ways. April Fool's day makes me cry. I'm painfully gullible in the face of deception without logic. Every time I think: "why would they lie about something so inconsequential?" Thus, I'm a sitting duck for pranks and Ihatethem. Pranks affect me so adversely that as April Fool's approaches every year, I remind my loved ones that they shouldn't prank me unless they want to witness me melting down on the spot.

I could write endlessly and aimlessly about this, but my ruthless chronic pain acts up more when I type for prolonged periods. It's become so agonizing that I can no longer draw, and I have no indication it will ever improve. My first love, my longest pursuit, my most-honed skill. My career. Each and every one, names for the same dead sapling.

Jeff is perhaps the only person I've told about this grief who can perceive the vast meaning of the loss. He and I have very different practices, styles, and trajectories -- but we've both been drawing for about the same number of years. Which is to say: our entire lives, if you count the way I do. 

Jeff and I both graduated with razor-sharp skills and beautiful portfolios from meatgrinder, prestige-belching institutions. But Jeff went to art school, and I went to theatre school. We both got messed up in special ways, curated to us as individuals, and we paid for the privilege. For a long time, I thought the best metaphor for my time as an acting student goes like this: You know how when a caterpillar contorts its own body to rend its way out of a cocoon? But now I know that's a lie. I may have written it, but it originated with my professors. Caterpillarsmust undergo pain to transform and fly. My acting "training" was abusive. Abuse is not what's "best" for the person being abused. It is violently, ruiningly unnecessary.

If I ever escaped my cocoon, I didn't do so in theatre school.

I did so right here, just now.

~

for the caretaker playlist

What follows is the game of my life, as thanks for the benediction.

~

The village of Roxaboxen lies in a one-acre wood. You are the local mapmaker who lives by the fallen oak. You spend your days drafting ever-more specific maps of the acre. This requires a steady hand and an inquisitive eye. Travelers arrive and depart, but some stay long enough for you to learn their names, their mannerisms, their fears. You sketch them in your free time and trade them maps of the surrounding area for shards of sea-glass. 

There’s the hunter. She moved silently and took several spoonfuls of sugar in her tea. Then there’s the blacksmith and his brother, who picked up odd jobs around the village and has a gap in his teeth. The blacksmith worked with thunder-metal found in sheets in the one-acre wood, so named for the sound it made when shaken. You remember that low, rolling sound. And Luke, you remember Luke. He stayed the longest. He taught you how to fold a piece of paper into a scorpion, how to throw a knife, how to laugh without trepidation. The other travelers still pass through every once and awhile, but you know you’ll never see Luke again.

Roxaboxen has changed over the years, shifting around you like roots enveloping a stone. The treehouse was built, and visitors from all over painted on its walls, and then, after years, it collapsed in a storm. Pets get old and die. Gardens bloom. Things are always rising up and caving in around here. Growing, decaying. 

Thankfully, your younger sister -- the local tinkerer -- is a constant. She once fashioned a functional axe handle out of a porch spindle. She’s dormant dynamite, full of potential energy. Although you’re the mapmaker and she’s the tinkerer, she’s the one who has ventured all over the outer lands. She brings back scraps for her work and artifacts for you. A small wooden box filled with teeth, a stone etched with unknown symbols, curiously strong magnet. She will always come back.

Your task, too, stays the same: map the one-acre wood with increasing detail. You take to mapping the deer trails through the tall grass. The footprints of a hurried chipmunk. The slime-path of a slug which spent the day sliding across your front step. You take to mapping the stars. There, the kite constellation. The mongoose. The scorpion, for Luke. You look up, and you look down. The universe spreads in all directions, endless, and you will never see more than a fraction of it, let alone map that fraction. You have fashioned yourself into an authority on the minute details of Roxaboxen. You’ve charted the residents’ daily routines. You’ve mapped the rambling paths of sleepwalkers. And for what? You will never be able to capture the totality of this place, or any place. 

What use is a mapmaker who won’t venture beyond their one-acre world? 

So, today, you’ve decided to leave. What’s out there? Have you brought enough ink? Do you have your pencil-sharpening knife? How many people will think of you once you’ve left? Will they remember your name? Will you remember theirs? 

Who knows you now? I mean, really knows you? 

When will you come home? Will you ever? Why not? What’s wrong with home?

Who do you think you are?

 Are you scared?

 Will you go anyway? ~~~ my other games

my other stuff besides games